


Strange Bedfellows

by LegendaryBard



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Bad Things Happen to Animals, Canon-Typical Violence, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Injury, M/M, Mentions of drugs, Minor Character Death, Past Child Abuse, Salecrow, Slow Burn, dark themes, fear toxin, salecrow’s just a little weird guys so be prepared for that
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-15
Updated: 2019-11-13
Packaged: 2019-11-18 11:20:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 19
Words: 71,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18119783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LegendaryBard/pseuds/LegendaryBard
Summary: A very strange scarecrow and a hatter with a Cheshire grin have taken to one another’s company. Really, it’s quite nice; even if there are some growing pains they need to work around.





	1. Coming Home

A song vibrated through the walls. 

“Hickory dickory dock,” the singer panted. 

A pale, thin-fingered hand set itself lightly against the wall. Black nails scraped against the soft, sea-rotted wood, leaving thin scars in their wake. “The mouse ran up the clock.” 

The figure was tall and spindly, with a stiffness in its motions that suggested injury. It swayed with each step. 

“The clock struck one.” The singer’s clothing had several layers of tattering; shredded black coats upon shredded black coats, like they’d been thrown to hungry beasts and subsequently sliced to ribbons in a frantic search for meat. Its hat, similarly mangled, had a long tail that bobbed when it walked. Straw bristled from underneath its hat, golden and brittle, falling in a crown around its head like hair. A roughly stitched burlap mask lay over its head, revealing only the slender aperture of its eyes. 

“And down he run,” it continued, languidly. “Hickory, dickory dock.” 

It stopped once the rhyme was over; like its motions had been powered by the words. Red eyes blinked, weakly, and it wet its lips and hesitantly began: 

“ _ À la claire fontaine, _ ” Its tongue was thick in its mouth, pronunciations childish and clumsy. It began walking again, each footstep slow and heavy, carefully deliberated. Its words became more of a pleading moan, pitched louder, like a baby trying to wail for attention. “ _ M’en ALLANT  _ **_FONTAINE_ ** _ —”  _

“Dear, are you back?” A shrill giggle rippled through the old wood, higher-pitched and clear. The figure stopped at the sound of the voice, a gleam overtaking its eye. 

“Jack and Jill went up the hill,” It croaked, pitifully, “To fetch a pail of water. Jack fell down and broke his crown, and Jill went tumbling after.”

“Sorry?” The higher voice said, mildly. 

“Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall,” The figure tried again, slightly exasperated, “Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty together again.” 

“Hmmm. Come here, Crane,” The voice said. “I can help you, but only if you come here.”

The figure- Crane- nodded solemnly, expression dulling. It hastened its stride, though moaning in protest on the first few steps. It withdrew its hand back to its body, drawing in its limbs. 

When it finally finished its walk through the hallway, it came to a large open foyer. The floor was bare and concrete, the walls and ceiling tall, though wooden and beginning to rot. The windows were high and dirty, washing the place with a grim grey cast of moonlight. 

In the middle of the room were a few things; an elaborately laid tea-table, complete with pure silver silverware set with jewels and tea-cups made of glinting gold and bone china, painstakingly painted with red roses and playing card decals. There were two ample workspaces, one of them coated with bits of wiring, circuitry, thin slips of metal, and paint. There was an array of slender tools set out, in varying sizes and tip-shapes. There was a scattered pack of playing cards and a few scraps of cloth and ribbon, randomly distributed, and a row of top hats in various states of creation. 

The other workspace was larger, more elaborate, with a stainless steel sink and a locked, wire-mesh cabinet, gleaming with dozens of different bottles of various fluids and powders. A centrifuge sat side-by-side with a mortar and pestle, and micropipettes shared space with a lumpy iron cauldron, currently empty. Various objects were scattered about the workspace: a tiny bird’s skull, a teddy bear with its face sliced open, spotless spoons and dishes, smooth stones and shiny bits of ribbon. Bland silver canisters glinted in the light, their nozzles innocuous but unsettling. Lines of needles, filled with a cloudy fluid, were neatly strapped to a leather bandolier. A jar of viscous fluid sat, bubbles caught in the gel like flies in amber, beside them. Small, hard tablets, no larger than a pinkie nail, were piled in a yellow-brown bottle. 

A man sat at the tea-table, pouring himself a cup. He was short- definitely no more than four-foot-ten- with a tremendously large green top-hat with a dingy lime-yellow band. A carefully written script was placed in the band: a faded piece of paper reading  _ In This Style, 10/6.  _

He had tufts of pale, scraggly blond hair, pluming outward from underneath the hat. His nose was enormous and potato-like, his blue eyes wrinkled and small, though friendly. He had an overbite, with teeth spilling forth unabashedly; due to this, his grin was quite striking. 

The collar of his coat and an over-large striped bow-tie hid much of his face from view, making his face appear crowded or squashed with detail. His height did that, too; he seemed like someone had left him under a hydraulic press for just a little too long. 

He had striped slacks and shined shoes, and an overlarge coat that teetered between acceptable and slightly shabby. His gloves were white and calfskin, with square fingers that were surprisingly deft.

Crane made a slight mewling noise, teetering towards him urgently. The man seemed receptive and sympathetic.

“Sit!” He ordered, with velvet firmness. “Draw a chair, have some tea.”

Crane collapsed in the chair beside the man, breath labored. 

“Rock-a-bye baby,” It groaned. “In the treetops. When the wind blows, the cradle will rock. When the bough breaks, the cradle  _ will fall. _ Down comes **baby** , cradle and  _ all.”  _

The man, who’d begun pouring tea, hesitated a moment. 

“Did you hurt yourself?” He guessed. 

“Yesss,” Crane said, through its teeth. 

“All of those songs are about falling—?” 

“ _ Yesss.”  _

“Oh, dear. Not badly, I hope?”

A miserable groan.

“Let me see,” the man coaxed, pushing a steaming cup of tea towards Crane. Nailed fingers delicately took the tea, and there was a slurp as it drank through the narrow mouth-slit in the burlap. The tea was overly sugared and hot, tasting of lemon, honey, and malt. It had been drugged. 

Crane knew. It drank, regardless. The tea was always drugged and it helped Crane sleep. 

Crane extended a slender leg out to the man, at his gentle instruction. Its boots were dull and scratched, treads spattered with mud and grime. The man pulled it off, smearing dirt on his lovely white gloves, and ignored Crane’s sound of pain. 

“What happened?” He examined Crane’s calf. Its ankle was red, beginning to swell and purple. 

“Polly, put the kettle on—” Crane murmured, putting the rim of the teacup to its mouth. It wanted to sleep now that it was safe. 

“Oh, none of that, now. No nursery stories, you hear me?” The man stuck his finger in Crane’s face, with mock-authority, like a seven-year-old trying to order around a five-year-old. 

“Batman,” Crane rumbled, reluctantly. “Tripped. Hurts.”  

“You didn’t  _ lead  _ him here, did you? ‘ _ The table was a large one, but the three were all crowded together at one corner of it: ‘No room! No room!’ they cried out when they saw Alice coming. _ ’”

“Georgie Porgie, pudding and pie,” Crane explained, wearily. “Kissed the girls and made them cry. When the boys came out to play, Georgie Porgie ran away.” 

“I don’t follow,” The man said. He gingerly set Crane’s leg down, and it winced when its toes touched the cold bare floor. 

“Mmmm _ joker,”  _ Crane elaborated.

“Joker interrupted you and Batman?” The man asked. “How fortunate. You’ve looked for tracking devices?” 

Crane reached a slender hand into its pocket, and withdrew a crushed piece of steel and wiring. It was broken into unusable splinters. Crane grinned.

“Brilliant as always, Crane,” The man said, affectionately. “Do you mind if I borrow that? The Batman’s technology has a particularly interesting architecture to it.”

Crane deposited it into his hand; the man tipped his hat with a grateful grin, and headed over to the table piled with spare technology and hats. He left the tiny device on the table, then went back to Crane.

“We’ll need to ice that.” The man said, indicating its swelling ankle. 

Crane made an unenthusiastic grunt. “The north wind doth blow, and we will have snow, and what will the poor robin do then?” 

“Don’t whine. It’ll help,” the man chided. 

“I am not a child,” Crane growled, idly. 

“Then don’t act like a brat,” the man said. “You’re nearly as impatient and whiny as that troublemaker Alice.” 

Crane’s expression flickered, angry, then dulled. It drank from its teacup again. 

“I’ll go get some ice,” the man volunteered, in a kinder tone. “I’ll be back soon. Please help yourself to some butter and bread or a tart while I’m gone; I always thought you were too thin!”

“Thank-you, Hatter,” Crane rocked in its chair, slightly, and reached for a silver serving tray laden with baked goods. It tasted, carefully, the fluffy lightness of the bread; and was pleased by the flavor. Savory rather than sweet, still dusted with flour. Crane drank the last of the tea, lapping at the dregs for the last traces of honey and the silt-like powder of whatever the Hatter had put in it. 

Hatter disappeared and Crane was left alone, nursing its hurting ankle and quietly gnawing on cold butter and bread.

It wanted the pain to go away, and it wanted to rest; it had been a long while since it had last slept, and it was desperately tired, but it had not been able to sleep regularly and soundly since it was a very, very small child. That was why it did not mind Hatter’s drugging. 

It was all but asleep when Hatter returned with an ice-pack. Its eyes were closed and its chest shallowly rose and fell; it was sprawled across the chair it sat in, its feet wide, limbs splayed, and its head lolled, chin snug against its chest. 

Its slitted eyes widened, and it made a distressed sound when Hatter gingerly lowered the ice pack to its leg.

“Don’t thrash, dear,” Hatter told it, sternly. It listened, screwing up its eyes tightly and gritting its teeth. It took a moment, but it relaxed, gradually, back into its chair. “There. Isn’t it better?” 

“Here we go round the mulberry bush,” Crane mumbled, drowsily. “The mulberry bush, the mulberry bush. Here we go round the mulberry bush, on a cold and frosty morning.” 

“I’ll take that as a thank-you,” Hatter said. He circled around Crane and sat down in his chair, pouring himself a cup of tea that was now only lukewarm. He squeezed in some honey, sadly watching it congeal at the bottom. He stirred, ponderously.

“I’ve been having a positively frabjous time with you, Crane,” Hatter tapped the rim of the cup with his spoon, shaking excess droplets from it. “You have been a most excellent guest at the tea-party. Why, I think—”

A sleepy exhale interrupted Hatter’s speech. Crane’s eyelids drooped, and its head, recently uprighted, slowly slumped forward. 

“Tut-tut. Just like the Dormouse, always sleeping at the table,” Hatter smiled, impish and good-natured. “Hopefully you’ll be good as new in a few weeks, dear. We still have  _ plans  _ for this mimsy city, after all.” 

  
  



	2. Out on the Town

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A pleasant walk becomes a fear obsessive’s greatest playground.

An odd pair made their way through Gotham.

“Dear, stop staring at people.” One of the pair was of a diminutive stature; the top of his head barely reached the other’s chest. He was dressed nicely, in a dark coat that draped to his ankles and a black top-hat that drew stares with how tall it was. “People think it’s rude to stare.”

The taller member of the pair- six foot three or more- shook its head slightly. It was slender and weedy, with fingers that were too spindly and arms that stretched too long. It was wearing a long coat and a deep, shadowy hat, giving the general effect of two orangutan children in a trench coat.  

“Needles and pins, needles and pins,” It grumbled. “When a man marries, his trouble begins.”

“I’m only trying to help,” The man said, tartly. “And stop talking in rhymes, it bothers people. I’m ignoring Cheshire even though he keeps rubbing against my leg; you can speak real words.”

Empathetically, the taller repeated: “When a man **marries** , his _trouble_ begins.”

“Well, at least that was only half of it,” The man conceded. “But I mean it. No rhymes, and—”

The taller person craned its neck around to stare at a passing woman pushing a gurgling baby in a stroller. Its red eyes locked on her tightly, rounded with interest.

“-- No staring!” The shorter yanked on the taller’s sleeve. “Crane, really! We have a purpose to-day, and we can’t have you ruining it! You can scare people later!”

Crane did not like to _behave._ It liked to act exactly as it wanted; whether on impulsive fancies or carefully charted plans and whims. It did _not_ like having its interests disrupted or being pulled away from something entertaining. Doggedly, it continued to stare, until the woman turned a corner and disappeared.

“She fears losing her son,” Crane turned its head forward now that its prey had moved away. It went on, sounding slightly guilty, but tickled to the point of being unwilling to stop talking. “I want to see her face contort in panic when she looks at the seat and sees that her babe is gone. She will shriek, Tetch. Her anguished screams will be a symphony.”

Reproachfully, the man smacked Crane on the hip, and it hung its head and silenced itself. It did not feel bad for staring, nor did it feel bad for talking; the only reason it settled was because it tremendously disliked the tone of voice Tetch adopted during his upbraidings. His words were prickly and fierce and not at all jovial or merry the way Crane liked. No, it was best to wait to talk again until Tetch softened.

It was very early morning in Gotham. The wind was cold and fierce, as it always was, and the smell of rain on the asphault was barely present above the constant stench of garbage, feces, and stale urine.

Tetch despised city life tremendously, but this was where all the _things_ were. If he lived out in the countryside it would be harder to steal jeweled tea-trays and 24-karat gold pocket-watches.

The pair passed by countless restaurants, pawn shops, corner stores, and every other thing under the sun. Laundromats, boutiques, florist shops, tattoo parlors, bars, residential complexes, carpet cleaning businesses; the list went on and neither of them were interested in keeping track.

The sun was starting to rise.

The people of the city didn’t wake up so much as turn from a trickle to a stream. The stray people wandering around became dense crowds, like mobile forests. Whenever the pair had to brave their way through a large enough cluster, Crane reached for Tetch’s hand and held it tight until they emerged on the other side. They had lost one another in crowds before, and it was very embarrassing for both of them when trying to find the other.

Crane mumbling _Did you ever see a laddie, a laddie, a laddie, did you ever see a laddie, go this way and that?_ to passersby usually ended in someone power-walking away before it could even finish its rhyme, and Tetch was also similarly avoided, even when he could say “Excuse me, have you seen my mate? They’re a very tall, funny-looking bloke wearing black—” without breaking into rhyme.

“Sometimes, dear, I’m tempted to go to the countryside,” Tetch muttered, letting go of his hat. It had a tendency to get knocked off when pushing through crowds. “Gotham is such a horrible place on foot.”

“Old McDonald,” Crane began obediently, “Had a farm.”

“He had the right idea,” Tetch said, gloomily.

“E-I-E-I-O.” Crane sang.

“There’s no Batman in England,” Tetch carried on, as though Crane had said nothing. “We have the money for a nice little house out in the middle of nowhere. We could have tea and grow poppies.”

Crane’s head twitched in his direction at the mention of poppies. Tetch knew how to make opium from the bulbs; and opium helped Crane sleep. Sleep, sleep; one of three pieces of Crane’s life that made it worth living. Resting peacefully, wreaking fear, and playing with Tetch; those were the _true_ joys on this black and soulless earth.

“Constantine,” Crane reminded, reluctantly. “Etrigan.”

“Pish-posh. They only deal in their slithy magic. They wouldn’t bother with us, would they?” Tetch asked.

Crane didn’t respond, but seemed to be thinking. Not speaking in rhyme appeared to be taxing its faculties.

“Yankee doodle went to town—” It stopped, and tried again: “How many miles to Babylon? Three score miles and ten. Can I get there by candle-light? Yes, and back again. If your heels are nimble and toes are light, you may get there by candle-light.”

“Sorry, dear? I don’t know what you’re trying to say.”

“Twinkle twinkle little bat,” Crane said, urgently. “How I wonder where you’re at.”

Tetch’s eyes glistened bright, and he softly sang, “Up above the world you fly, like a tea-tray in the sky—”

“No!” Crane interjected. It pulled its thin-boned fingers from Tetch’s hand to express its annoyance. “He could _follow_ us.”

“But he wouldn’t, would he?” Tetch pouted.

“Could,” Crane said, and muttered, almost compulsively: “Bobby Shafto’s gone to sea. Silver buckles at his knee. He’ll come back and marry me. Bonny Bobby Shafto.”

“I don’t think the Batman likes you that much, dear,” Tetch said, kindly.

Crane gave an irritated grunt. If it had another hand to remove from Tetch’s grasp, it would’ve.

The sun rose higher. They waded through another school of commuters. Crane thought about letting Tetch fend for himself, but took his hand and pulled him through.

They passed by a restaurant. The glass doors swung open, and the smell rushed over the two of them, tantalizing and heady. Their diet these days was almost exclusively tea and bread, and the smell of exquisitely cooked meat brought a flood of memories to both Crane and Tetch. Crane remembered the smell of homemade jerky in its family farm’s smokehouse; Tetch recalled when he was very young and his mother had spent hours preparing a fine cut of roast beef for his father’s fiftieth birthday.

Urgently, Crane grasped Tetch by the arm.

It whined, obnoxiously, “Jack Sprat could eat no fat. His wife could eat no lean. But together both they _licked the platter clean!”_

“But we’re—”

Crane shook him, firmly. “Little Jack Horner sat in the corner, eating his Christmas pie. He put in his thumb, and pulled out a plum, and said what a **_GOOD_ ** boy am I!”

Tetch hesitated. “Have you got any money?”

Crane grinned.

It pulled away from Tetch, who had been all but glued to its hip since the walk began. Its movements changed; the stiff, wobbly walk of an unaccustomed pedestrian dropped into the narrow, anticipatory hunch of hunger. It approached the doors.

“Oh dear, oh dear,” Tetch murmured, reaching into his pockets. Nearly a dozen thin strips of metal were retrieved, one side carefully painted _10/6,_ the other with bare electronic wiring. “Crane, dear, remember the Batman! We’re supposed to be—”

Crane pushed open the door.

“Duck,” it said, happily. Patrons barely looked up. It was Gotham City. You got stranger people than Crane on a daily basis.

“Duck,” it declared again, eyes roving around. There was a few dozen occupants. It was a nicer establishment than a fast food joint, but not someplace that would require a reservation.

“Duck,” Crane repeated. Tetch had caught up, and the door clattered loudly behind him when it closed. The multiple “ducks” had finally caught some attention; a few people looked up, bemused or annoyed.

“Goose!”

Crane moved with shocking, deceptive speed. At one moment, it seemed as though a gust of wind would be all that was needed to topple Crane over; the next, it blurred through the booths and was upon a patron, cackling like mad.

Meanwhile, Tetch was being _very_ indulgent to let this happen. In fact, Crane’s actions were actively jeopardizing their plans.

What he _should_ have done, Tetch reflected from his position by the doors, was place a card on Crane. It could be so very difficult to control when it put a thought in its head… but a card gave you complete control if you knew how to use one properly.

There was a signature hiss of aerosol; Tetch fumbled in the lumpy pockets of his coat for a respirator. When you worked with Crane, it was a good bet to keep a gas mask on you at all times. You never knew when Crane had fear toxin, or in what form, or when it would use it.

Gleefully, Crane hollered: “Ashes to ashes, we all _fall down!”_

The screaming started quickly. Bodies writhed and clawed at themselves or others, caught in throes of mutilation. Crane was torn between fits of exaggerated cackling and deathly silence as it stooped over a thrashing, prone body to carefully listen to a person’s fear.

“Dear!” Tetch called, muffled, after a half-minute or so of chaos. “We should get something and go! We don’t have time for this!”

Delightedly, Crane cried back: “Sticks and stones may break my bones—”

“-- But the Batman can hurt you, dear! Grab something and let’s go!”

Disgruntled, Crane dropped the woman it was holding by the hair; it straightened and padded around, looking for an uneaten plate. Its attention was caught by a child huddling under a table, hugging one of the legs; tears streamed down his face, and he stared sightlessly forward, begging, “please don’t take mommy away” . Crane stooped, seizing his face, still round with baby-fat.

“Mommy’s never coming back,” Crane crooned, sweetly. “She’s being taken away and it’s all your fault, you nasty little boy.”

Tetch’s slap- delivered to the back of Crane’s head since it now lay in Tetch’s reach- stung, and nearly knocked off its hat. Crane rounded on him, hissing indignantly.

“What did I say?” Tetch demanded.

Crane’s expression twitched. Its eyes flickered from the sobbing little boy to Tetch, and it grumbled to itself, straightening. Tetch firmly seized one of its hands, pulling it along.

“Don’t make me put a card on you, dear,” Tetch threatened. “Do you remember what we went in here for?”

Hesitation, then, “To market, to market to buy a penny bun. Home again, home again, the market is done.”

“Right,” Tetch confirmed.

Crane gave a regretful look out at the diners; all screaming and crying and it couldn’t even enjoy it.

It claimed a plate that lay beside a wailing, weeping family of three; and turned up the corner of its burlap mask to wolf down a seemingly untouched hamburger. It was still warm; salty, fatty, delicious.

Crane wanted to watch the patrons while it ate, but Tetch had a very warning look on his face and it didn’t want to disappoint him again.

Tetch left Crane with a final hard, purposeful stare; he headed into the kitchen, stepping around a writhing cook. He’d have to make his meal to go.

He began rummaging, but it wasn’t long before he was interrupted.

“This is so beneath the two of you,” A muffled voice said.“Stealing food? It was only a month ago you broke into the Gotham Gala and took the Anwhistle pocketwatch.”

Tetch turned round- a freshly baked pie in hand.

A man- slender, but still muscular- stood in the doorway, a respirator fixed snugly over his mouth and nose. Tetch recognized the greens, reds, and yellows of his clothing; recognized the gloves and boots and mask, the coif of black hair and the bright face.

Robin, the Boy Wonder- though he wasn’t much of a boy anymore. It was the older Robin, not the new kid that had his head affixed to Batman’s hip.

A muscle in Tetch’s cheek twitched; a blind panic flooded through him, then tremendous calm. His mouth filled in the response automatically:

“‘If it had grown up,’ she said to herself, ‘it would have made a dreadfully ugly child: but it makes rather a handsome pig, I think.’”

“Real nice, Hatter,” Robin slunk forward, slowly. Tetch’s mind stretched back as he tried to recall what this Robin’s signature weapon was. Was he the one with the stun sticks? The staff? The sword?

At least it wasn’t the one Joker sent off the deep end, the one with the guns—

“Y’know, if you just give up, I won’t have to hit you,” Robin said, languidly. An indignant prickle swept through Tetch’s stomach, hardening in his throat. Robin didn’t consider Tetch a threat in the slightest; and perhaps he had already dealt with dear Crane. His arrogance was infuriating. “Come on. We’ve done this song and dance so many times— you know I’m gonna kick your ass and haul you back to Arkham—”

Tetch, defensively, pulled the pie towards himself.

“If that’s the way you like it!” Robin shouted. He lunged; Tetch slammed the pie down on a shelf, then scrambled to escape. Tetch narrowly dodged a grab, slipping past Robin. He bolted through the kitchen doors and bellowed:

“DEAR!”

Crane stuffed a handful of fries in its mouth, wiped its greasy hands on a fallen patron, and said, “Mmmhh—?”; then it spotted Robin, and immediately drew itself to its full height in alarm.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!” Crane shrieked, scrambling over top a table. Tetch ducked and Robin flew over his head, landing cleanly a few feet away. The Boy Wonder pulled a small cylinder from his belt, and it expanded into a short silver staff.

“Come at me, bro,” Robin yelled at Crane, who hissed venomously but nevertheless shrunk back. Tetch pushed himself up from the tile floor, straightening his hat with one hand and reaching for his coat pocket with another.

Tetch was barely able to draw his pistol before a staff smashed into his face.

Crane lunged at Robin while he was preoccupied, and they rolled in a tangle of limbs. Crane could be savage when it liked; and its absurdly long, sharp nails could do real damage even when it was without a proper weapon.

Robin thrust Crane off after a few seconds, sending the scrawny thing sprawling. Half a dozen new wounds split Robin’s forehead, and multiple scores had been cut into the respirator, though most of the clawing was centered around the eyes; Crane had been trying its hardest to gouge them out.

“Dirty fighting, Crane,” Robin’s confident demeanor had shaken somewhat with the mauling, and he regarded Crane more seriously, staff held aloft to force a little distance between them. The hero rapidly blinked blood out of his eyes.

Tetch made a muffled sound from where he was cradling his face. He could feel blood leaking from his nose and it was getting caught in the respirator’s filters.

“Beat him when he sneezes,” Tetch wheezed, trying to get up. Robin’s eyes darted between the two of them, narrowing in anticipation. He rushed for Tetch first, flipping dramatically through the air and slicing his leg downward; Tetch leapt out of the way and scrambled to his feet, a spurt of blood accompanying his movement. Robin kicked him solidly in the stomach, and Tetch collided with a nearby wall. He slid downward, one hand over his nose and the other folded over his middle. The hatter seemed to be concentrating on trying to breathe without retching or choking on his own blood.

Crane made an attempt to tackle Robin, but the hero spun around just in time; he brought up his staff to block Crane’s effort at a throat-gouging swipe, and bashed Crane’s chest with it. Crane staggered with an audible sucking gasp, but recovered fast.

“And IIIIII’LL HUFF,” Crane roared, as soon as it could draw breath.

Robin tensed.

“And I’ll PUFF!”

There was a footstep behind Robin, and he reacted on instinct.

“AND I’LL BLOW YOUR HOUSE DOWN!!”

Robin threw himself out of the way, and Tetch cursed, stumbling over where he used to be. Crane reached out to steady him.

They rushed at the same time- Robin’s staff gave him range, but couldn’t fend off two at once. Tetch went low and Crane went high; Robin’s staff whacked solidly against the side of Crane’s head, staggering him, and Tetch seized the opening.

He, like Crane, went for the face; but his interest was not in tearing out Robin’s eyes. His fingers slid on the smooth plating, then—

Robin forced him off, but Tetch had a firm grip on the respirator, and it came away with him. Robin had the foresight to draw breath, and was careful to hold it.

Crane, who had been momentarily forgotten about, promptly drove its fist into Robin’s stomach, doubling him over and knocking the breath from him.

Robin’s resistance was weak after that- he still attempted to attack Crane and Tetch rather than escape, but the two of them merely had to evade now that their hand had been played.

It wasn’t long before Robin was striking at ghosts, and both Crane and Tetch wearily exited through a back door in the kitchen, unaccosted. Tetch was careful to take the pie on their way out, and as soon as the door was closed, handed it off to Crane.

Tetch removed his respirator, shoved it in the dark recesses of his pocket, and took out a handkerchief. His nose was swollen and red, and the entire lower half of his face was shiny and smeared with blood. He jerkily dabbed at it and winced.

Crane stared, intently- its expression was unreadable, but its posture said concern.

“Don’t fuss,” Tetch said, smartly, though his shaken voice and jittery motions ruined the effect. No matter how many times you had to fight someone, it never got any less nerve-wracking; plus, he couldn’t be sure that he hadn’t inhaled trace fear toxin vapors.

Crane made a throaty sound, which meant that it hadn’t the energy to make real words, nor an appropriate nursery rhyme to use. These situations were rare, but manageable.

Tetch tucked his handkerchief away and took back the pie. They started walking, but not too hastily. The key was to not draw attention by running around with your arms flailing and all but yelling “I participated in criminal acts!”

“How is your head, dear?” Tetch asked, conversationally. “That brat hit you.”

“He fell out of bed, and bumped his head,” Crane said. “He c-” It stumbled, then forced itself onward: “He _couldn—_ He _could—_ get up in the morning.”

“You’re fine?”

A nod.

“That’s a relief.”

Crane gestured, jerkily, to Tetch’s face. Concern shone in its eyes.

“It’s not broken,” Tetch said. “Just sore. It feels like it’s in the right place, and it doesn’t hurt ungodly bad to breathe.”

Crane overtook him (easily, with the length of its legs) and stood firmly in front of him.

“What, dear?”

Crane stooped and kissed Tetch’s swelling nose, with a small, childish _‘mwah’,_ then straightened and pulled away. It resumed walking as though it hadn’t happened.

Tetch wasn’t sure what to make of it- so he just kept walking, too.

Maybe after their big job he could talk to Crane about it…

Or not. Dear Crane was so fickle these days.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldn’t leave this at just one chapter, so I’m shaking things up!


	3. Asylum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lazy summer afternoons.

Jervis Tetch was thirty when he was first sent to Arkham Asylum. He was young at the time, and just beginning to wax into his prime. He had a promising career. He had developed technology unlike the world had ever seen or known. He had one of the wealthiest men on the planet as his boss, and Bruce Wayne had  _ personal  _ interest in his projects. Everything was going right— until Tetch met Her. 

But he didn’t want to think about Her. Not anymore. 

Another arrival, very close to Tetch’s own stay at Arkham, was Jonathan Crane. Crane was— Well, no one  _ knew,  _ exactly. It enjoyed a similar- though not  _ quite  _ as anonymous- status as Joker. Crane’s name was all that was known; tracing through records, it didn’t have a social security number, birth certificate, or church record of its birth. No records in the educational system. No public pictures. No friends or family. And it certainly wasn’t stable enough to answer serious interrogation. 

Both of them were terrified when entering Arkham. They had gone through hell at the courts, spent much too long in local jail, and were rattled by the treatment they had been handed. Police had spat and sneered at them; they had endured verbal and physical abuse, interrogations, denial of rights; particularly  _ Crane,  _ who couldn’t properly articulate what was even happening to it to anyone who could help. 

Arkham was a new, fresh hell; they didn’t know what to expect, but both braced for the worst. They braced to be alone, beaten, humiliated, medicated against their will, restrained, and restricted. 

“But I don’t want to be among mad people,” Tetch whispered to himself as he was frog-marched through rows of cells. There were calls and jeers, or interested glares through slatted black bars. ‘New patient, new patient!’ the cry rang; furious whispers and yells swept through the prison like fire in a hayloft. 

“Oh, you can’t help that,” Tetch told himself, nervously. “We’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.” 

Tetch twitched, furiously; one could’ve easily mistaken it for an attempt to pull free. One of the guards barked at him, telling him not to move.

“How do you know I’m mad?” Tetch murmured.

“You must be,” Tetch responded to himself, “Or you wouldn’t be here.”

What they got was better than they were expecting. Not great. But  _ better.  _ The doctors were more educated and adapted more quickly to their patients’ respective eccentricities. The guards were watchful, and only violent when provoked. The potential caveat to this conditional niceness was that medications were mandatory, and if you were unwilling, they could be forced down a throat with businesslike efficiency. The guards were shockingly good at making  _ sure  _ people took their medicine. 

Crane and Tetch both spent the first few months cycling through medicines of various kinds, amounts, and side-effects. They went through dozens of therapy sessions of different varieties. There were, typically, no beatings or raised voices; kind words and gentleness prevailed with docile patients, which Crane and Tetch had both quickly learned to be. 

The first time they were allowed out into the Arkham grounds (there was a probation period where they had to prove they weren’t a danger to themselves, and most especially others) it was in spring. The grounds were wide and expansive, and a piece had been cornered off for prisoner enrichment. 

Tetch stepped out onto the soft grass, felt the warm breeze, and shuddered. 

He threw himself enthusiastically into the field, half-sprinting and tripping over himself in his haste. The guards yelled a warning, but did not pursue. Tetch stopped, jerkily, and dropped to his knees in the grass, plunging his hands into the soft sprigs. 

It was strange what you  _ craved  _ after months being surrounded by concrete. The smell of freshly blooming jasmine, clinging to the walls, nearly made him cry. 

There was a blur of motion faraway, towards a cluster of quietly talking inmates. Tetch thought, for a second, it may have been the White Rabbit. But it was gone. 

Tetch was escorted back inside after an hour. He’d started trying to weave a hat out of grass stalks. They made him leave it outside. 

Crane’s first day out was a few days after Jervis’. It did not like being touched and shied away from its guards, but they were able to coax it out and lead it through the halls. 

One thing that the doctors could not shake from Crane was its need to have its face covered. When its mask was removed it thrashed and screamed and fought like it’d been possessed by the devil; then, when it was left alone, it carefully tore at its bedsheets in order to create a new one. 

The doctors allowed Crane the temporary privilege of a mask until they could work on that particular facet of its treatment. At the moment, Crane’s caretakers were more preoccupied with its eccentricities and trying to coax it to speak in proper sentences. 

The guards let Crane outside. It blinked at the light, and wobbled forth into the sunshine and grass like a baby deer. The guards kept a respectful distance, though their hands lay on their weapons. 

Crane walked a little ways, snugly wedged itself between the tremendous roots of a massive old tree, and lounged with its body languidly splayed.

After a while of lazing, it sat up and rocked itself, happily bubbling: 

“Row row row your boat

Gently down the stream,

Merrily merrily merrily merrily

Life is but a dream.” 

It repeated the song, over and over again, until a guard came over and gently interrogated it to see if it was alright. 

Crane obediently submitted to a search of its person, then sat back down once the guard went to search someone else. 

“Here we go ‘round the mulberry bush, the mulberry bush, the mulberry bush,” it softly told itself. “Here we go round the mulberry bush, on a cold and frosty morning.” 

It sang through a handful of verses. It sang and sang and sang until it was escorted back to its cell; it didn’t want to go, but the threat of being tazed or hit was enough to coax it to its feet. 

It was quite some time before the two got the chance to meet. Crane had several stints in solitary confinement for aggressive behavior, and Tetch was reprimanded after stealing jasmine blooms and trying, fruitlessly, to make tea with it. It was May the first time they were both released into the yard simultaneously.

They didn’t talk to one another that day; Crane went to its tree, its  _ territory, _ and everyone knew to stay away. Crane had been growing out its nails again, and in April, it had attacked an inmate that tried to piss on its tree ( as a joke, the inmate claimed ) and left him with semi-permanent facial scarring. 

Crane had accrued the same sort of reputation as some of the other inmates with striking physical characteristics: there’d been some humorous attempts at calling it “sheetface”, which eventually became “shitface”, until the inmate was attacked. Then, conspicuously, talk about it just became “... that guy by the tree…”, with the occasional illuminating gesture to one’s face. 

The only ones who talked to Crane anymore were guards and some curious super-criminals. 

Joker visited most often, when he wasn’t in confinement. Crane did not like him. He seemed like a hyena that would giggle at you up front, and then lash out from behind when you tried to ignore him and walk past. 

Others visited, but only once. That was all it took. The deep voice singing soft nursery rhymes, the steady rocking, and the sad, unnerving grey sheet over its head turned most curious explorers away. 

It was a hot, muggy afternoon in May, the air filled with equal parts heat, water, and bugs. Crane was doubly grateful for the tree it’d staked out as its own: its shade sliced through the oppressive wet heat, and the bugs kept away from it. (Crane’s tree had lots of birds, because it smuggled food from mealtimes to feed them; nevertheless, they swept upon any nearby bugs with hungry abandon.)

Crane noticed someone approaching it. They didn’t have the black-and-blue tactical clothing of a guard; rather, the drab grey of a prisoner. They-  _ he,  _ Crane hazarded- was short, unusually short, perhaps even the shortest man Crane had ever seen. He had wings of long blonde hair that stuck straight out, flaring widest around the ears and flattening down at the top. He had a long, lumpy nose and crooked teeth, a short neck and small, upturned eyes that had a nice friendliness to them. 

Nevertheless, Crane was on guard. 

“Rain, rain,” Crane sang, as the man got nearer. “Go away. Come again another day.” 

The man stopped, but did not turn back. In a slightly whimsical voice, he asked: “Can I sit with you?”

Crane had months of flattery and gentle questioning from doctors to prepare it to answer such a request. Tremulously, and with clear difficulty, it said: 

“N-ooo—” It began shaking. Its nails bit into the roots. With a tortured gasp, it tried: “Little Bo-Peep lost her sheep, and doesn’t know where to find them. Leave them alone, and they’ll come home, wagging their tails behind them.” 

The man stared at Crane for a moment, and it wanted, furiously, to sink into the ground. 

“Does that mean you want me to leave you alone?” The man said, politely. 

Crane’s tensed muscles relaxed. Good. The man had understood its answer. 

“Okay,” the man agreed, readily enough. He moved, more than a dozen feet away, right on the very edge of the shade, and called: “Do you mind if I sit here?” 

Crane mustered: “No… M… M-Mary, Mary, quite contrary—”

The man sat. He started  _ doing  _ something with the grass. Picking it. That upset Crane for a moment- it thought of that as  _ its  _ grass, and it didn’t want it plucked- but what he was  _ doing  _ to it was fascinating. 

His fingers were winding skillfully, performing some kind of magic to turn the overgrown, starchy sprigs into something. Crane watched, raptly, as the strands wove together to become a flat, thatched square; then, eventually, a recognizable (though small to the point of being humorous) hat shape. A bright little arrangement of dandelion flowers was placed in the band.

Crane watched as the man gingerly set it on his head; then he looked over and  _ winked  _ at Crane. 

Crane scrambled over on all fours. The man yelped and jerked back, expecting to be attacked, but Crane didn’t touch him. 

It stopped short and pointed, violently, at the hat. It whined, loud and insistent. 

The man, with some deliberation, removed it, then handed it to Crane. 

Crane turned it over in its hands, obsessively. It picked at the protruding edge of a blade of grass, and motioned to pull it out. 

“Oh, don’t do that,” the man said, gently, but did not try to stop him. “It won’t be easy to put it back in again, and even if I do, it won’t look as nice as it does now, will it?” 

Crane thought about that for a moment, and left the strand alone.

“I can teach you how to make them,” the man offered, his eyes beginning to sparkle, “But I’d like you to do something for me, too.”

Crane cocked its head. This was another doctorism, it knew; this man would demand the moon in exchange for teaching it how to weave, and Crane wasn’t sure it wanted to do that much for a stranger.

At the look of hesitation, the man said, “I want to have a tea party.” 

Crane tipped its head in the other direction. 

“They won’t let me have any!” The man’s voice pitched slightly in desperation. “I can hardly brew my own— I don’t have the resources, or friends, or—”

Crane simply stared, uncertain how to react to the outburst. 

The man exhaled, taking firmer control of himself. “I’m sorry. I get overexcited when tea is involved, and the new medicine they’re giving me makes me… irritable. My name is Jervis. Jervis Tetch.” 

“Scarecrow,” Crane said, just about the only non-nursery rhyme word it could manage without being sent into a shaking fit. 

“It’s nice to meet you,” Jervis said. Crane was convinced he meant every word, and that pleased it to no end. It was his eyes, warm and friendly, and his voice, calm and measured. “Now, would you like me to show you how to weave?” 

They practiced. Jervis was a lot faster, a lot better, and it took Crane lots of mental energy to remember the interlocking order of all the grass strips when there was more than a dozen. 

But none of that mattered. Crane was engrossed in its task, completely fascinated by it. It became a fairly nice substitution for sewing, which, itself, was a substitution for chemical mixing. 

When it came time for them to head back to their cells, Crane got snappish and surly; spitting at the guards from where it sat, partially-woven squares of grass and weeds strewn everywhere around it. 

Jervis gently said to it, “If you go with them, tomorrow I’ll teach you how to make shapes”, and that was all it took for Crane to get up willingly.

They were nearly inseparable after that day. 

Summer in Gotham, while not as hot as the south, was  _ wet,  _ and that was nearly unbearable. Crane’s mask was always damp with sweat, yet it refused to remove it. 

Tetch could, to some degree, sympathize. He felt the same way about his hat when he was younger, and even now, there was a haunting compulsion that spurred him to make facsimiles out of grass and newspaper. 

May became June, and June became July. They sat under the shade of Crane’s tree and would mostly not say anything to one another; Crane would softly hum the tune of a nursery song and Tetch, who had run out of nearby grass, would lay on his back and close his eyes and try to remember the sound of the Dormouse’s drowsy voice, the texture of the March Hare’s fur, the taste of the tea and bread, or the coolness of cold china under his fingertips. The color of Wonderland seemed to have dulled, a little. He yearned for the sight of Alice’s yellow hair in the sun, but it was closed off to him. The doctors said he was improving. 

Sometimes Crane would loudly sing songs and recite rhymes, or drag a fingertip through the dirt and etch drawings in the earth. Other times it would listen to Jervis, who had, in frustration, begun reciting Alice in Wonderland from memory. It seemed interested- interested enough to stop humming and pay attention, at any rate- and a few weeks later replaced its rendition of “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” with the lyrics of “Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat”. It stared hungrily at Jervis during, and thoroughly enjoyed the praise lavished on it afterward. From then on, some of Carroll’s poems made their way into Crane’s repertoire, though what qualified them for quoting seemed to be fairly random. 

In August, Crane approached Tetch, and Tetch, as the norm became, handed it what he was weaving so it could look closer. Crane, who accepted all things with a glimmering curiosity, did not take it. It, instead, shifted closer to Tetch and unfurled its long limbs. It laid its head on Tetch’s shoulder and wrapped its spindly limbs around him, loose enough for Tetch to pull away if he really liked.

“Are you upset?” Tetch asked. Crane could manage “yes” and “no” now, but only if it wanted to, and it was a fickle thing.

Crane growled, pushing its forehead more insistently against Tetch’s neck. 

“Do I need to call a guard?” Tetch tried. 

“No-o-o.” Crane croaked. It sounded like the hinges on a rusty door. 

“Alright,” Tetch said. 

They sat there like that for some time. Eventually a guard came over to see if they were okay.

“Alright, what the hell is this,” Briggs, a tall man built like a redwood tree, had stopped in front of them. “Tetch?”

“I think the poor thing is having a bad day,” Tetch said, giving Crane a small pat on the back. 

“Do you want me to get him off you?” Briggs asked. Crane’s head twisted around and it gave a hostile glare. 

“Now I lay me down to sleep,” Crane said, sharply, “I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.” 

Briggs gave the two a once-over, then shrugged and walked off. He and the other guards were enjoying the shade the walls provided, and were reticent to leave it to bother the patients. 

Crane did not let go until it was time to head back to its cell. And even still, Tetch had to carefully unpeel Crane’s arms from around himself. 

Tetch stood up, and offered his hand to help Crane; Crane took it. It had cold, bony hands, and was deceptively light when Tetch hauled it to its feet. 

From then on Crane was not shy about touching; both giving and receiving. It became nice to lie together under the tree, telling stories or rhymes; affectionate brushes of the hand became commonplace, and Tetch finally began calling Crane “dear” in casual conversation. Not on purpose; it just seemed right. Natural. 

Crane’s vocabulary broadened.  _ “Thank you, Tetch, Hatter, tea, Jervis”  _ began entering conversation. 

In September, they had their first tea-party. They sat under their tree and did their best with what they had. Smuggled cups and plates, breadrolls that were carefully stolen or hidden, and, most beautifully of all,  _ tea.  _

The sugar was in little packets and the tea had to be drunk cold, but they made do. It was the happiest Jervis had been in a long, long time. 

Unfortunately, an act so brazen  _ had  _ to be noticed. The guards fell upon them in fifteen minutes- hardly enough time for tea!- and their stolen property was confiscated. Crane fought. Jervis fought. 

They were separated.

The cold isolation of September and most of October felt like a festering wound, compounded by the revoking of their yard privileges. Crane refused to speak anymore, and Tetch felt a sense of blooming, horrible helplessness. He didn’t even have Wonderland to fall back on anymore. Arkham had stolen that from him; replaced it with sleepiness and fuzz. Arkham had stolen  _ Crane  _ from him, his dear friend that he had spent so many sunny summer afternoons with. They’d stolen his freedom, his color, his sunshine, his warmth; and he would never truly,  _ really  _ be free, no matter how good his behavior was. 

Eight days before Halloween, the Maximum Security wing exploded. 

Tetch wouldn’t know this until later, but the explosion came from a storage closet. Tetch was outside when it happened, his  _ first  _ trip outside since the tea incident. Brick burst outward in a shower, and a plume of smoke bloomed from the gaping exit hole. 

Tetch could see a dark shape leap through the swirling fumes; then disappear as it flew over the tall, spired fences Arkham was known for. 

He knew in his heart it was Crane. 

He tried not to be stung by the fact that it hadn’t even tried to take Tetch with it. 

But it still hurt. 

The escape was confirmed two days later; though by rumor rather than official announcement. 

“Your squeeze got away,” Joker told him at breakfast. Tetch had only spoken to Joker a few times. He generally found him a strange and off-putting character, but so far, non-hostile; so Tetch tolerated his nonsense. 

“My what?” Tetch asked. 

“Your honey! Your sugar!” Joker said. “The cuckoo flew the nest, Hatty.” 

Tetch sat. His usual table had a few muscular, tough-looking men. A subtle identifying mark appeared on their clothes; grass stains in random patterns on the chest. It  _ meant  _ they were Joker’s crew, but  _ why,  _ Tetch had no idea. The man had all the charisma of a viper, and yet, he attracted cronies like honey caught flies.  

“Oh, was that Scarecrow? I saw it for myself, but couldn’t tell,” Tetch said, carefully neutral. “Very dramatic.” 

“He didn’t  _ tell  _ you about it?” Joker’s tone was falsely shocked. 

“We haven’t talked much,” Tetch said, mouth tasting of acid. 

“But the two of you were so  _ close!  _ You lovebirds looked like conjoined twins some days,” Joker carried on in his mock-surprise. “You mean he  _ didn’t  _ tell you he was  _ leaving?  _ He didn’t even try to bring you along?” 

Joker smacked his lips, contemplatively. “I never had the crazy thing pegged as the pump-and-dump type, but, there you go.” 

Tetch’s hands were starting to shake. He had the strange, impending feeling that he was about to be shanked. He hadn’t taken his medicine yet. 

“I don’t know what Crane’s planning,” Tetch said, truthfully. It was in response to the question Joker hadn’t asked, but Tetch sensed underlying his words. 

Joker’s smile disappeared. He leaned forward, his pointy nose an inch away from poking Tetch’s eye out. 

“Be honest with me,” Joker said. His breath smelled like mouldering orange juice. “Is he coming back for you?” 

“He didn’t say,” Tetch told him, levelly. 

“I didn’t ask what he said. I asked if you think he’s going to come back for you.” 

Tetch’s eyes wandered. There was a guard, watching, hawklike; but he made no motion to intervene. The Cheshire Cat- who Tetch hadn’t seen in quite some time- was staring from the rafters, blue eyes icy and watchful. It seemed to notice Tetch looking at it; it faded, leaving behind a lingering, sharp-toothed grin. 

“Stay with me,” Joker hissed. A sharp object made itself apparent, prodding Tetch’s kidney. Joker wasn’t the one holding it. “Is he going to come back for you?”

“Yes,” Tetch said finally, daring to hope. “Yes, I think he will.” 

The pressure eased. The creases in Joker’s face smoothed into a sardonic smile.

“Oh,  _ really?  _ You think a complete maniac like that will come back to get  _ you?”  _

Tetch was trying his hardest not to snap. He really was. But the questioning was  _ hurting  _ him— it felt like Joker was digging around a wound and looking for shrapnel that wasn’t there! 

Tetch had lost his appetite. He pushed his tray away and Joker’s cronies looked at one another, then scarfed it down without asking permission.

“Yes,” Tetch replied, testily. Joker’s smile widened a crack. 

“Then listen to me very carefully,” Joker’s voice lowered to a level hardly above a murmur. “If he gets you, I want _ you  _ to take me along, or the next time you get in here, I’ll make sure your next trip out is in a body bag. Got it?”

Tetch did not think of himself as timid or cowardly, but his legs felt like gelatin and his intestines felt like water. That toothy smile terrified him. 

“Alright,” he said.

“Good!” Joker’s smile widened until it seemed as though it would split his cheeks. Tetch saw a haunting fragment of the Cheshire Cat in him; like the indifferent toleration it’d shown towards Alice became incredible greed and animosity. It was wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Not how the Cheshire Cat should be at all.

There was a Halloween party the day of Halloween. It was exclusive to people with good behavior. Tetch declined to go even though he was permitted. 

He was wondering, again, what Scarecrow was doing. Vainly, quietly hoping that it would come for him. 

He wanted the Dormouse and March Hare, but they did not appear, no matter how desperately he wished for them. Alice did not walk down the corridor in a pretty blue dress and give him a ditzy smile. There was no distant screaming from the Queen. No wails from the Duchess’ baby.

The loneliness would kill him before he would get out of here, that, he knew. 

October became November, and, nearly two weeks after Crane’s flight from Arkham, Tetch was awoken in the middle of the night. 

Tetch’s heart was pounding, for some reason. Like he’d just run a marathon. Faraway, there was a voice, crackling and distorted. 

His heart was fluttering. His muscles spasmed, and he found himself unable to move. Shapeless forms of chaotic restlessness swirled in the dark; teeth, tentacles, claws, red eyes. The Queen let out a choking shriek; one of the  _ things  _ wore the March Hare as a coat, and wiggled a limp paw before disappearing into the dark.

There was screaming, but it all seemed far-away. There was a greasy smell in the air, like spraypaint huffed from a canister. 

Tetch tried to close his eyes, but there was a sucking pressure bearing down on him, and the phantom sensation of tightening; he had the overwhelming premonition that he was being buried alive. Sweat broke out over his skin, and his eyelids tore open. 

He was in Wonderland, but it wasn’t Wonderland; it was dark and cold and black. Alice was crying somewhere nearby. 

“Alice?” He cried. Something was terribly wrong. “Alice!?” 

He tried to run to her, but the familiar footpaths of the forest twisted and turned, leading to dead ends and long loops. Giggling interwove with Alice’s sobs, leading to a crescendo of shrieking laughter. Tetch felt like he couldn’t breathe, and when he tried to call for her again, no sound left his throat. 

“Shh, shh,” a familiar sound pierced the laughing and weeping. “Shh-shh. Goodnight, room. Goodnight moon. Goodnight cow jumping over the moon. Goodnight light, and the red balloon. Goodnight bears. Goodnight chairs…”

The next thing Tetch remembered was waking up, lying prone with his head in the lap of a stranger; there were red eyes peering down into his own. 

“Hush, little baby.” Spiderlike fingers brushed a lock of Jervis’ hair off of his sweaty forehead. “Don’t say a word.” 

Tetch opened his mouth to say something, then closed it.

“Mama’s gonna buy you a mocking-bird,” Crane sang. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Backstory.


	4. Barn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fear, straw, and the hatter.

Jervis sat up. His bright blue eyes were misty, mired with confusion and addled with Crane’s toxin.

Crane felt a passing moment of guilt; it hadn’t meant to dose Jervis with the gas, but it couldn’t be helped. Air particulates didn’t care  _ who  _ breathed them. 

Crane crowded closer to Jervis, partially entangling the hatter in a hug. It didn’t want him to move around too much. He could hurt himself in his confusion; it knew all too well the climb from paralyzing fear to normality was a difficult one. 

“Where are we?” Jervis asked, muzzily. 

The hatter did not try to stop Crane from holding him. It was one of the things it liked about Jervis— Jervis didn’t always attempt to prevent Crane from doing what it pleased, and he never,  _ ever  _ demanded rationale for behavior. 

But returning to his question. Crane wasn’t sure how to respond; concepts and ideas surfaced in its mind in response, but they were impossible to articulate. They were soap bubbles- if it touched them, they would burst. 

It gazed down, helpless and sad, at Jervis. 

“Oh,” Jervis said, scrubbing his hand over his face. He looked tired. Crane wished he would go back to sleep. “I’m sorry. Can you do yes-or-no right now?” 

Crane nodded in affirmation. 

“Are we far away from Arkham?” 

Yes, they were. Crane dragged Jervis to the last safe place, someplace comforting and familiar, someplace surrounded with traps to stop any enterprising bats and fluttering robins. 

Crane nodded. 

“You got me out?” 

Another nod. 

Jervis looked to be thinking about something. His brow furrowed.

“Joker!” Jervis burst out, suddenly. He pulled away from Crane, who made a wounded noise. “Oh,  _ no,  _ oh no, no, no!” 

Crane tried to shush him, to calm him with soothing strokes to the shoulder and a firm rub against his back- as Jervis had so often done for it- but he would not be settled. 

“Go to sleep, go to sleep—” Crane chanted, anxiously. 

“No! You don’t understand, Scarecrow!” Jervis turned round, one hand cupped over his mouth. “Joker  _ threatened  _ me! Threatened to kill us both if we didn’t break him out of Arkham!”

Crane stared. 

“If Batman catches us and takes us back to Arkham, Joker will  _ kill  _ us, dear!” Jervis was trying to infect Crane with his own panic, but the threat seemed to Crane too faraway for it to settle in. 

Nevertheless, Crane’s friend was upset, and it was obligated to do something. 

Crane gently placed its hands on his shoulders, and murmured: 

“You fear Joker? Yet you are allied with the god of fear, Jervis Tetch, and if we so wished we could snap him like a twig. He is nothing to be scared of.” 

Jervis could not have looked more stunned if Crane had broken into a spontaneous and perfectly executed showtune.

“What on  _ earth?”  _ It didn’t have Crane’s intended effect, but worry had become astonishment, which was an improvement. “You spoke! Spoke sentences _!”  _ Tetch’s eyes lit up, and his crooked-tooth smile unfurled, and there was the wondrous glow to him that Crane so enjoyed. 

Crane could speak more than just nursery rhymes- of course it could speak for itself, it wasn’t some sort of babbling baby or brainless parrot- but sometimes,  _ most times,  _ non-rhymes just wouldn’t…  _ work.  _

The exception was when  _ fear  _ was involved. Oh, Crane could be articulate **then** . It had to. It  _ had  _ to properly express its feelings, and all the delicate shades and flavors of language meant it was only limited by its creativity.

It had to be well-read, too. In fact, it  _ loved  _ new and difficult words, because those new words meant it had a more precise name to set to its observations about  _ fear.  _

“Can you say something else?” Tetch asked, fascinated. 

Like an infant with keys. Or Crane with a crying child. He had forgotten all about Joker by now! 

Crane licked the inside of its mouth considerately. Every time it tried to summon words, they withered like a bale of rotting straw before the harvest. It couldn’t hold onto them, couldn’t speak them. Only the important ones, burned into the wrinkles of Crane’s mind, would allow themselves to be shaped and formed in tandem with Crane’s brain and tongue.

Crane shook its head, regretfully. 

“Oh,” Tetch said. “Well, it was… intriguing to hear.” 

Crane opted to take that as a compliment. 

Slowly, it rose, carefully leaving Tetch’s side while still being within touching distance, lest he need its help. 

Tetch cast his gaze out at their new hideaway; then scrutinized Crane more closely. 

“Your clothes,” Tetch noted, considerately more at ease than he had been. “They’re… is that your, erm, costume?” 

Crane beamed. 

“I’m a dingle dangle scarecrow with a flippy floppy hat!” Crane shouted, clapping its hands. 

“Yes, dear, I see that. I like the hat especially.” 

It was black and patchy, with a wide brim and a great big tail. Crane liked it, too. 

“I can’t help but notice that your coat is letting in daylight, dear,” Tetch told it, gently.

Crane looked down at itself. It had on, most prominently, a tatty old black coat that draped to the knee. The fabric had been sliced into shreds that stirred restlessly when it walked, giving it the appearance of a raggedy, constantly shifting, multi-tendriled  _ thing. _ It liked looking like that. 

Jervis went on: “You’re not, eh, breezy? I’ve made a few jackets from scratch, you know. I don’t just do hats.” 

Crane shook its head. It patted its chest empathetically. 

It had nice long gloves without the fingers (to allow its nails to better function in melee fights), grey pants, and muddy leather boots that were scratched and scraped, but the insoles were soft and worn and comfortable. It had a piece of twine around its neck that served as a bolo tie, and its own custom burlap mask. The scratchy fabric felt comfortable on its face; like welcoming rays of sunlight after too long in the cold. A halo of dry, brittle, crunchy (bad for stealth but pleasing to listen to when touched) straw protruded from underneath its lovely hat, bristling forth not unlike Tetch’s own untamed locks. 

It  _ liked  _ the way it looked.

“Alright then,” Jervis appeared to understand Crane was satisfied with its ragged clothes, and so he looked down at himself, still in the drab grey of Arkham’s prison uniform. “Do you have anything I can borrow, dear? I want to be out of this awful thing and into something more vibrant as  _ soon as possible.” _

Crane deliberated a moment, then turned in a swirl of fluttering tatters. 

They were in Crane’s home away from home: its barn-laboratory, far on the outskirts of Gotham. Getting Hatter here hadn’t been easy. As a matter of fact, it had been anything but, considering Crane had to teach itself how to steal a car  _ and  _ how to drive in the short span between escaping from Arkham and coming back to get Tetch. 

( Crane had made the decision to abandon its stolen truck a few miles from the barn; if it had more time, it would’ve rigged a way to drive it off a cliff or something similar, but it wanted to get Jervis to the barn before he awoke. It seemed unbearable that Jervis should awaken on the way and be lost, confused, scared…)

Scared. 

Crane's mind wandered, indulgently. It liked seeing people scared, and this Hatter was no exception; or was he? Crane had walked into his cell and shushed his screams with the soft words from a storybook from its earliest days. It had pitied him and his suffering and made him breathe the burning scent of chemical sleep until he was limp and boneless. It had carried him out past all the weeping and shrieking inmates and only looked back a few times, instead of gleefully pouncing upon the poor, terrified subjects of its gas as it normally would.

Crane had a very binary way of viewing the world these days: people were either  _ subjects  _ or  _ threats,  _ and Jervis, even from his first meeting with Crane, was neither. It left him in strange territory. Uncertain territory. Crane was not sure whether it would like to see him weeping in the corner from exposure to its toxin, or if it would like to curl up in his lap like a Saint Bernard sprawled on a six year old. 

It knew that it liked when it was called dear in that soft sing-song voice, but doubted Jervis would call it that when under the influence of fear. It knew it liked the soft touches and gentle smiles and his reassuring smallness. 

But it  _ also  _ liked the little whimpery sounds Tetch had made when Crane had retrieved him, liked the way he’d shielded his eyes and writhed. Crane had memorized every detail; every line wrinkling his face, every pitch-shift in his cries, every minute motion of the hand as he fought something invisible. It was thrilling, and also, strangely, left him feeling  _ guilty.  _ Crane didn’t feel guilt for anything these days. It was open and unabashed in its pleasures- even having been accused by doctors of having no social awareness or sense of ethics- but not  _ this  _ time. No, this time had been  _ different.  _

Crane would make the firm decision now: Tetch was not, in terms of fear, interesting. No matter how much it may seem to the contrary, Tetch was dull, boring, mundane, stupid. Not even worth wasting toxin on. 

If Crane told itself that enough, perhaps it would begin to believe it was true. And it could concentrate on the nice, steady voice when it called him  _ dear  _ instead of being distracted by stray thoughts of Tetch as a walking target. 

All of Crane’s clothes (there weren’t that many) had been thrown on a slightly decaying hay bale in the corner; Crane loomed over them, considerately sifting through the heap. There was positively nothing in Jervis’ size. Most of Crane’s clothes were too big for  _ itself,  _ because it liked oversized clothing. 

And Jervis had requested something  _ vibrant,  _ too, but everything Crane owned was in shades of grey, black, or muddy brown. 

It turned around to Jervis and hoped its stare could convey its inability to help.

“Well, no matter,” Jervis stood up from the patch of straw Crane had lain him in. He dusted scraps of the stuff off his back, and, eyeing Crane considerately: “Clothes are a small trifle, dear. I can stand this mimsy little outfit for just a little longer!”

But Crane did not think so. Crane, in fact, did not think that Jervis believed what he was saying even the slightest bit. 

Crane hurriedly swept over to Jervis. It felt anxious. Unusually so. It wanted to touch him and reassure him that everything would be alright. 

But then a thought struck it. A nice, settling,  _ warm  _ thought. 

It knew what to do. Knew what could make this place feel more  _ homey,  _ what could make Jervis more  _ welcome,  _ what could distract him from his garb. 

It carefully climbed up into the loft. The loft was where it slept. Where it kept its things.

It had lots of  _ things.  _ Things that were  _ Crane’s  _ and no one  _ else’s,  _ and if anyone touched them Crane would hold them down and watch their darkest nightmares play from the outside; and only once the fear ebbed would it slaughter them and display them on a stick outside of its barn as a warning. 

No, perhaps not that drastic. The best method of disposal was to let the crows have them, then bury the bones.

Speaking of the crows… Once Crane went to the loft, a few that were roosting in the rafters stirred, one of them with a soft, considerate croon. Crane liked birds. Crows especially. They were smart, and good nonverbal communicators, which meant Crane didn’t need to speak much to teach them things. 

“Dear, should I follow you up there?” Tetch asked from below. “I’m feeling dizzy and I don’t much feel like risking a climb.” 

Crane thought. 

“No,” it said, finally. “Jack be nimble. Jack be quick.” 

Crane scoured through its hoard with the tremendous sound of clattering metal; it seized a tarnished tray and a tattered old cardboard box, deliberating a moment before setting aside a other few things, too. It then hastened to the edge of the loft, and leaned over, and dropped them over the side. ( It was mindful to not hit Jervis, who looked tired and bewildered. )

“Polly put the kettle on!” Crane burbled, leaning just a little too far down off the edge of the loft. “Polly put the kettle on and we’ll all have tea!”

It was a set of tea-things, though tremendously old and not incredibly well-taken care of, but functional nevertheless. 

Jervis’s eyes lit up as soon as he recognized what Crane had dropped down. 

“Tea! Oh, we could make real tea! Not cold and in plastic cups!”

Crane nodded, jerky and fast, pleased Jervis had seen its plan. It carefully grabbed the teacups and kettle (too fragile to be dropped from such a distance) and snaked its way back down to ground level. Jervis delightedly took them from its arms. He placed everything with the same kind of precise speed and skill that made it alluring to watch him weave. 

They had no table or tablecloth, but they did have a stove and a water spigot. The kettle was set to boil. Crane sat down with its legs folded, hands on its knees, to wait. Jervis sat opposite.

The cups were washed and cleaned (not that either of them completely minded dirty dishes) and everything was gathered together. They had no milk, but they had sugar, which was enough for now. 

There was no talking while they waited, though Crane grew slightly bored around the five minute mark and began rocking and humming “Mary Had A Little Lamb” over and over again.

Eventually, the kettle whistled an impressively loud note. Crane perked up; Tetch hurried over to the kettle and treated its contents with the same reverence as liquid gold. 

Once poured, they raised their cups and had their first drink together as free men.

It would most certainly not be the last. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please let me know what you thought. :)


	5. Meeting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The two go to a nice evening meeting with some acquaintances.

A long, skinny arm with long, skinny fingers reached out; with some effort, it hauled up the form of a small little man, dressed to the nines. 

The long skinny arm belonged to a long skinny person, who was made of so many twisting angles that it was a wonder it could stand up without toppling over. It did a once-over of the small man, then leaned back into an awkward, hip-jutting, shoulder-slumping slouch. 

The man brushed invisible specks of dust off of his bottle-green overcoat; he straightened his hat, stared remorsefully at his slime-speckled shoes, and turned his head to look at his companion. 

“I know they’re convenient for travel, but the Gotham tunnels are awful, dear,” The man complained. His companion tilted its head curiously, so he went on: “Rats. Vagrants. Feces. It’s a good place to go if you want to spend time with the people so destitute they can’t even sleep on the street.” 

The companion hummed, considerately. “A hurry of hoofs in a village-street, a shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark, and beneath from the pebbles, in passing, a spark.” 

The shorter of the two looked at it curiously. “I haven’t heard that one.” 

“Listen, my children, and you shall hear,” The taller murmured, “Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere.”

“Oh, it’s  _ American.”  _

“My country ‘tis of thee—”

“Oh, please, let’s not mix politics with pleasure, dear. What were you trying to say?”

The taller wrestled briefly with its tongue.  _ “Fast.”  _

“Oh, I suppose. Not much foot traffic down there.” The man leaned up on his toes and smoothed a wrinkle from the taller’s coat. 

The coat was a clean, new-looking thing, paired with a wide-brimmed hat that would’ve made a very nice bonnet for a garden party, had it not been jet-black. A burlap mask obscured all of the coat-wearer’s face but its eyes, which were narrow and curious. 

“I appreciate you wearing this for me, you know,” the man said, gently arranging the taller’s lapels. “I  _ know  _ you like your usual clothes better, but you clean up so nicely, Crane!” 

The compliment appeared to have fried its tongue momentarily; it blinked, rapidly, and managed: “Th-thaank youuuu. Jervis.” 

“Only a statement of truth, dear. Now, let’s go. Shan’t keep them waiting!” 

The tunnel mouth they’d just crawled out of lead into a crumbling brick building, which they were now standing in. Dusky orange light shone in through gaping holes in the ceiling, and everything had a fine layer of grime that stirred in clouds when the two walked by. 

They left. 

The neighborhood they’d come out in was dingy, empty, silent. Bricks were chipped, wood was rotting, lawns were overgrown and strewn with trash, glass was broken or missing. Things skittered into the dark recesses of condemned houses when they passed by. Crane kept turning to look, and tripped over itself or a jutting piece of sidewalk more than once. Jervis told it, firmly, to pay attention where it was walking, and thirty seconds later, had to catch it after it tripped over an uneven edge in the sidewalk. 

They finally stopped in front of an unremarkable, run-down house. Jervis drew a small little card from the folds of his coat, and scrutinized it closely. 

“This  _ is  _ the place?” Jervis asked. 

Crane didn’t respond. 

“Mmm, I think so, too.” Jervis put the card away and strode towards the house. Crane followed, though reservedly, with a cold and suspicious expression plastered to its mask. 

The windows had been thoroughly boarded up; not a single glimpse of the interior could be seen from the outside, and it seemed strangely quiet on the walk up the drive. The wind, for once, overpowered the venomous sounds of honking and talking that permeated the air of greater Gotham. A dog burst into a flurry of barking far away. A small, dark shape soared overhead, just visible in the dying rays of sunset, before disappearing behind a broken-down fence. 

Jervis checked his pocket-watch. It said six o’ clock. It was not six o’ clock. 

They climbed the steps to the porch. It was empty. Conspicuously so. There ought to be leaves strewn about, or cobwebs, or  _ something.  _ This smacked of occupied unoccupation. 

“Should I knock, dear?” Jervis asked, rearing a white-gloved fist. Crane didn’t reply. “I’ll knock.” 

He knocked. It was three short, sharp raps. 

There was a long moment of silence; then the door creaked open. 

Nicotine-yellow light spilled forth, from a dingy bulb in a long hallway. The door opener was a small, turkey-necked man with one hand currently occupied by a small wooden puppet in a pinstriped suit. The puppet glared at them, angrily. 

“Get movin’, dummies,” The puppet demanded. Jervis stepped over the threshold, indicating for Crane to follow. 

“He didn’t mean it,” The puppeteer whispered, hurriedly, as they passed. “He’s in a bad mood. Everyone is. Watch yourselves.” 

The puppet and puppetmaster brought up the rear, with Jervis in front and Crane glaring back from his place in the middle. They went through the hallway, past a few holes in the walls and scarred-up doorways, into a main room that was fully furnished and had a few stragglers mingling about. 

Some the two knew, and were expecting. The meeting was advertised as a place for the unsung few. The  _ strange.  _ The overlooked. 

Waylon Jones occupied an entire couch by himself, curled on his side, his thick tail draped over one of the arms. He was drinking directly from a bottle of vodka, and had a large duffel bag at his feet that was full of over a dozen other bottles. Evidently he’d fancied himself as the drink provider for the get-together.

Garfield Lynns flicked a lighter on and off, mesmerized by the glow. He was leaning on a wall by the backdoor. The residue of extinguisher foam was still present on his clothes.

Otis Flannegan was kneeling by a hole in the baseboards, offering a handful of seeds to the rats, which were obediently stepping forth in a queue to take their share. 

“Is tha’ the lass’a you?” Jones perked up at their arrival, pulling the vodka bottle out of his mouth with an audible pop. “I ain’ wai’in anymore.” 

“I think there’s someone else coming,” the puppeteer said, nervously. “Please be patient, they probably won’t be long…” 

Jones’s nostrils slid shut, and he lowered his scaly head back down onto the couch. “Ye’ bes’ be hopin’ so,” he murmured, gloomily. He reached into the duffle bag and retrieved what looked  _ very  _ conspicuously like a human femur, which he began to gnaw on impatiently.

“Ohh!” Lynns snapped his lighter shut and rushed forth to greet Jervis and Crane. Jervis rocked back in uneasiness, and Crane clamped a possessive hand on his shoulder. “I remember you two. Do you remember me?! Firefly!”

The man looked like a raisin. His skin was waxy and tough, covered in welts and boils; it adhered to the lines of his bones and muscles in unsettling lumps, and he had no hair to speak of. His eyes were bright and brown, with the slight faraway look of someone who was thinking about something else  _ constantly.  _ His muscles spasmed and jerked, manically, in constant tics and twitches. 

“Of course,” Jervis said. “We met in Arkham. You were the one who lit Warden Shedd’s shirt on fire.” 

The man threw back his head and cackled. “Yes! Such a beautiful little blaze!”

Shedd, once he’d realized what Lynns had done, had clubbed him with his truncheon and put him in solitary confinement for a month. That was three years ago; during the fourth time that Jervis and Crane had been interred in Arkham. ( Though they hadn’t stayed long. Seasoned prisoners in Arkham had a penchant for escaping. ) 

“Quite,” Jervis said. 

He and Crane quietly escorted themselves to the unoccupied loveseat beside Jones’s couch. Considering their respective sizes (small and average, thin and long) they had plenty of room to not touch one another, but they stayed snug. After a moment of getting settled, Crane used its knee to shake Jervis’s legs, entertaining itself by watching his dangling feet jiggle.

“Dear,” Jervis warned, face coloring slightly. Crane, reluctantly, stopped.

“Haven’ seen you boys inna h-while,” Jones opened one of his eyes, and lifted his head. His teeth gave a contemplative  _ clack  _ against the bone. “Though’ Bats migh’da go’ssha by now.” 

His accent, inebriation, bone, and lack of lips made for a devastating butchery of his words. It took them a moment. 

“Oh no! We had a little run-in with the boy wonder a few weeks ago, and we’ve been underground ever since.” Tetch waved him off. “Batman is  _ so  _ protective of them after that little Jason Todd debacle! We thought it best to wait for his wrath to cool.” 

“S’fer sure,” Jones agreed. “Li’l bas’sard kid’a his knock’t out one’na m’teeth th’other day’n took it as’sa tro’hy. Bats never would’a let ‘m do tha’  _ before.”  _

“God, I wish I would’ve gotten the chance to burn that Todd kid!” The excited rasp of Lynn’s ruined voice cut in. He inhaled with wet, sucking gasp, and went on: “At least then I’d feel better about getting Bat-brutalized!” 

Jones, Jervis, and Crane all looked over. Lynns was sitting on a nearby table, excitedly gesturing with his hands. 

“Wouldn’ talk like that, brother,” Jones muttered, closing an eye and returning to his bone. Everyone resumed operating in their own little world; the spell of socialization had broken. 

Flannegan finally stood up, dusting his gloves off on his pants. He sat down on the table, beside Lynns, and checked his phone. 

“It’s getting to be late,” Flannegan had a smooth, gentle voice; the kind of voice that got quieter the longer it was used, best suited for dealing with small animals or children. “I have lots of little babies to get home to, so if this meeting is going to be something, I’d like it to be  _ now.”  _

Jones grunted, shifted with an audible creaking of his spine, and dug into the duffle bag. He produced a handful of shot glasses, then a bottle of vodka. 

“Y’won’ feel th’time passin’ a’ter a coupla these.” Jones offered, then rolled onto his stomach, sprawling with the same indolence as a spoiled house pet. “Bu’ I’m wit’ ye, brother. If whatever boss man what call’t us here dudn’t show, I’m gonna piss on’na floors an’ see how he like cleanin’ it.” 

After a moment, the Ventriloquist walked over from the entrance to the hallway, then stopped mid-way to the couch. He stood there, nervously; then the puppet pivoted on his hand, turning towards Jones, and spat: “Gudge up, you gig gastard, I wanna sit.” 

“Still dunno how’t do b’s, I see,” Jones said. He, against all odds, moved; perhaps amused by such a demand. His tail curled inwards, and he shifted into a sitting position, leaning heavily on the armrest. He put his bone away and replaced it with his old vodka bottle. 

Gingerly, the Ventriloquist sat down, trying to take up as little space as possible.

A minute elapsed; then two, then three, then five, then ten. Crane got bored and started fidgeting, mumbling nursery rhymes under its breath. Jervis started counting individual strands in the dirty, dust-trodden carpet. Jones appeared to have fallen asleep. The Ventriloquist sat in silence with his head down, turned slightly away from the puppet, who bristled with silent, unending rage. Lynns was trying to look at Flannegan’s phone, and chortled occasionally at a meme that crossed an endless media feed of cute rat pictures. 

After a while, Flannegan tucked his phone back in his pocket, crossing his arms and glaring holes in the walls. A lone rat, grey and scarred, scurried out of the shadows and ran up his pant leg; Flannegan lowered his hand for it to stand on, then lifted it up to eye level.

“Someone’s coming,” he declared, in his soft baritone. “A man. Tall. Thin. The rats are scared of him, whoever he is, and I find them to be a good judge of character.” 

“A rat toldja all that?” Jones asked, opening an eye. There was no disbelief in his voice, but Flannegan responded as if there had been. 

“Yes, they’re very intelligent. And I wouldn’t be throwing stones, Jones, seeing as you’re a sentient crocodile.” 

“I ain’. It’s a skin condition.”

Heads turned. 

“It  _ ees,”  _ Jones drawled, defensively.

“The skin condition that gives you a tail, a jaw full’a sharp teeth, and scales? Not even dummy here’d fall for that gullshit.” The puppet squalled, slapping the Ventriloquist’s upper arm for emphasis. 

Jones’s eyes narrowed to slits. He drank more and declined to comment. 

There came to be a knocking at the door, startling most everyone. After a beat of pause, the Ventriloquist hurried to his feet to go get it, rapidly pattering down the carpeted hall. 

“Christ, fine’ly,” Jones said, sounding relieved. “Here’s hopin’ we’ll git paid overtime fer wait’n’ so long.” 

There was a high-pitched shriek, then deeper-sounding yelling— a thump, Ventriloquist blubbering, Scarface shouting, another thump, and then silence. 

Crane was on his feet in an instant. Jones was looking very alert, sitting on the edge of the cushions and posed for action, though he hadn’t quite got off the couch yet. Tetch was reaching for his pistol with his right hand and his respirator with his left. Lynns had a can of bugspray, materialized from nowhere, and his lighter, looking eager to burn something with a homemade flamethrower. Flannegan was gently, horrifiedly, cradling his rat, and had backed away several steps. 

From the darkness of the hallway, a shape appeared.

Tall. 

Thin.

_ In a purple suit.  _

Crane hissed, irately. Jones’s tail crashed against the table with a tremendously loud and meaty thump, accompanied by a bark-like roar of outrage. Flannegan shrank back, Lynns slowly lowered his makeshift weapons, and Tetch guardedly kept his pistol in hand. 

“Oh, it almost seems like you’re all not happy to see me.” Joker said, with a dazzling smile. 

“I ain’ come here t’get joked on by sum  _ clown,” _ Jones roared, slamming his hand down on the table. It cracked, audibly, and he jabbed a clawed finger in Joker’s direction. “Y’all bett’r put up, Joker, ‘r else y’better git th’hell outta my face. Ye got sum damn nerve showin’ yer pasty ass here.” 

“So much  _ hostility,”  _ Joker admonished. “Of course I didn’t just gather you all for the giggles!”

Tetch and Crane made brief eye contact. 

They’d had  _ experiences  _ with the Joker before. Bad ones. Joker had tried to kill Tetch back in Arkham (the second time he was sent there), and was only thwarted by a chance appearance of the Batman, who happened to be delivering Crane at the time. And even after that, there were multiple more attempts on their lives in Arkham, all unsuccessful because they stuck in a defensive pair. 

The murder attempts gradually died off after a while; the both of them figured Joker must’ve forgotten why he was so angry at them to begin with. 

But  _ they  _ didn’t forget. It was hard to not remember your closest friend grabbing at your clothes while they were bleeding from a stab wound, their red eyes bright and shocked. It was hard to forget being cradled in thin arms and jostled around as you were carried to the nearest guard, with comforting rhymes scream-whispered while the world around you spun. It was hard to forget gently touching your dearest friend’s bruised face and scabbing knuckles and trying to comfort them by stumbling through your memory of the Red Knight and White Knight’s battle. It was hard to forget sprawling in the lap of someone half your size and clinging to them while you shook like a leaf. Hard to forget the blood, the stress, the animal anxiety, the pain, the  _ terror.  _

Crane growled, “Every night when I go out, the monkey’s on the table. Take a stick and knock it off.  _ Pop  _ goes the  **weasel** .” 

Tetch lifted his pistol and Joker quickly threw his hands up in the air in surrender. 

“Hold on a minute! Hear me out,” Joker yelped. 

“I ought to shoot you,” Tetch said, stiff-jawed. “It would save everyone a lot of trouble.” 

“The poor babies here would get to eat something,” Flannegan crooned to the rat in his palm. “They haven’t had fresh meat in  _ soooo  _ long.”

“Always wanted t’know f’clowns taste funny,” Jones spat. He finally stood up. The top of his head nearly scraped the ceiling, and his mass suddenly seemed far more wide and imposing it had on the couch. 

The only one left to speak in Joker’s defense was Lynns. 

“Are we gonna be  _ burning  _ things?” Lynns asked, elated. He kicked his legs like an excited child. 

“Maybe!” Joker said, somehow managing to look at him while keeping an eye on Tetch. “I think all of us wackos get a bad rep! We’ve got to make people take us seriously, and what better way to—”

“Fuck you,” Jones rumbled. “Yer a big man, clown. You’s famous. You ain’ disfigured like me. You ain’ nuts like Scarecrow. Yer jus’ mean ‘cos it gits yer rocks off. You  _ ain’  _ one of us, an’ I ain’ gonna stand fer you insertin’ yerself inna crowd ye don’ belong in. So don’ try yer ‘brothers, brothers’ shit w’me.” 

There was a flash of murderous wrath that crossed Joker’s face; then it was quickly replaced with an easygoing smile. 

“I can see I should get to my point.” Joker said. 

“Please,” Flannegan scratched the rat in his palm behind the ears. 

“I want  _ your  _ help to  _ really  _ get at Bats,” Joker swept his arms behind his back, and hazarded a step towards them. Crane shrunk back, its grip tightening on Jervis’s shoulder tight enough to hurt. Jervis’s aim wavered. “SO! I propose we put together a  _ freak  _ menagerie! Featuriiiiiiing— drumroll please—”

There was no drumroll. 

“Big naked lizard—”

Jones snarled.

“—Walking piece of beef jerky!—” 

Lynns didn’t even seem to realize Joker was talking about him.

“Beastiality trial waiting to happen—”

Flannegan’s face whitened with rage. 

“—Weirdo in the big hat with a tea fetish—”

Crane bristled on Jervis’s behalf. 

“— And, last but not least, the spookiest manchild homosexual to ever walk around in burlap—” 

Jervis shot him. 

The sound made everyone jump. Joker recoiled, then stumbled, instinctively closing one hand over the new hole in his stomach. Blood flew, then spattered on the walls and floor. 

“We are  _ leaving,”  _ Jervis groped backward blindly for a second, then found Crane’s hand. With tight, hasty little motions, Jervis pulled Crane past Lynns to the back door. As they left, there was a glimpse of the grisly new scene in the living room; Joker was cradling his stomach and not a single person moved to help him. 

“Horrible, awful man,” Jervis seethed, slamming the door behind him. “Where does he get off calling you that?” 

“Took ill Thursday,” Crane said, sounding slightly satisfied. “Grew worse Friday. Died Saturday. Buried Sunday.” 

“One would  _ hope,”  _ Jervis snapped, clicking the safety back on and stuffing his pistol back into his pocket. “Humph! This has ruined my night something  _ terrible,  _ dear.” 

Crane patted his back comfortingly. 

“The gall of him to ask  _ us  _ to help him when  _ he’s  _ backstabbed us! Figuratively and literally!  _ Multiple times!”  _ Jervis ranted. They waded through knee-high grass in the back garden, strewn with litter, until they reached the fence encircling the yard. Jervis knelt and slid under a broken section while Crane clambered over top. They ended up on a cracked, weedy sidewalk. 

“Calling you a  _ manchild—”  _

Crane gently laid its hand over his mouth. Once it was sure Jervis was looking at it, it shook its head with a weary look in its eyes. Jervis pulled its hand away. 

“I’m sorry, dear. Just— Ergh! I  _ hope  _ that shot kills him.”

However, if he had  _ really  _ wanted Joker dead, he would’ve shot him more than once. Acknowledgement of this crossed both of their minds on their hasty stroll through the condemned slice of suburbia. 

The thought made Jervis uncomfortable. He wanted to squirm his way out of it, but it stuck to him, like an ill-fitting second skin. 

“Maybe we should go do something else tonight,” Jervis said, abruptly. “It’s still young, after all.” 


	6. Bowling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They go bowling. What could go wrong?

It was an exceptionally slow Tuesday night at the Pennypack Creek Bowling Alley.

As a matter of fact, there wasn’t a single person there other than the staff. (There were three people; the manager, who was on his phone with his irate wife in the backroom, the new hire, who was mopping the floor again since there was nothing else to do, and the employee who was up front and desperately fighting the urge to check her phone for the fifth time in thirty seconds.) 

They closed in an hour, and the prospect of doing nothing for that long but  _ pretending  _ to be busy was soul-crushing. 

The woman upfront- her nametag read  _ Birdie-  _ was just about to go ask the manager about closing early when the door opened. 

Pennypack Creek was an old bowling alley. It’d been one of those attractions that’d come up around the time of the Second World War, then never had cause to die. So it lingered.

Bowling Leagues came in and bowled most weeknights (but not Tuesday) and on weekends there were lots of kids from the schools who enjoyed the alley as a sort of  _ tradition, _ from when their parents made them go as little kids. There was also lots of families, the occasional pack of friends, and rarely, dates and double dates. 

But most of them were  _ regulars—  _ or if not regular _ s,  _ they were regu _ lar _ . Normal people. Decent people. People with nine to five jobs and an education and clean clothes. Sure, they could get a little crazy if they’d had something to drink, but… For the most part,  _ normal.  _

Birdie was not prepared for who pushed open the bowling alley doors. 

They were like a human yin-yang. One of them was exceptionally short, and the other was exaggeratedly tall. 

Neither was the smallest or largest person she’d ever seen, but standing next to one another only made them look more extreme. The short one wasn’t chubby, exactly, but he was definitely of denser make. The tall one was as spindly as a needle. 

( He- that being, the tall one- was wearing a mask that looked like it was a repurposed potato sack. Alarm bells rang in Birdie’s brain, but customer service instinctively took over. )

“Hello, gentlemen! Welcome to Pennypack Creek Bowling Alley, can I get you a lane?”

She prayed they would say something like: “Bowling? I thought this was the cosplay meetup, sorry” but they didn’t.

“See, dear?” The short one elbowed the taller one. His elbow came up to his hip. “It could be fun. You don’t know.”

The tall one was definitely the more threatening-looking of the two. His eyes were locked on Birdie’s with intensity the likes of which she’d never seen before. She  _ swore  _ they were red. Really  _ red,  _ not dull burgundy brown, but candy apple  _ red.  _

It was the way he stood, too. Even at rest he was crooked, and he held his body out at odd angles; he appeared to compensate for his jagged stance by constantly swaying to correct his balance, which was even MORE bizarre. 

The shorter had a straight back, and a pleasant facial expression even if it wasn’t on equally pleasant facial features. His teeth would make a beaver pack up and go home, and his nose seemed poorly stuck on his face, like God had been dozing off when he sculpted it. His eyes were wide and strangely trustworthy, and he appeared no younger than thirty-five. How old after that, though, was a mystery. 

They were both oddly dressed for a bowling alley. Mostly at Pennypack the patrons wore casual clothes— a t-shirt, jeans, whatever. Sometimes people came in in suits and dresses, almost exclusively if they came directly here from church. But  _ these  _ two…

The shorter had on a flowy white undershirt and emerald green vest, and a watch chain protruded visibly from his pocket. His slacks were pressed, and his shoes had been newly shined. He had on  _ spats,  _ for God’s sake, and they went out of style a hundred years ago. 

The taller was in a fairly nice-looking jet-black coat, buttons shined and lapels carefully arranged. He had on a wide-brimmed hat, nice ( though slightly dirty around the ankles ) pants, and dress shoes. 

Birdie could not fathom what on  _ earth  _ they were doing, dressed like that, in the year of the Lord 2018, but what did she know? Maybe they were… cosplayers. 

“Sir?” Birdie prompted. “Would you like a lane?” 

“Oh, yes!” The little man leaned up on his toes. “Is it difficult? My dear Crane and I were walking by and thought it might be fun, but we’ve never been before.” 

_ Crane  _ seemed more like a title than a name. Birdie mentally filed it away for a potential police report. 

“Oh, no,” She said. “It’s not difficult. We get newbies who bowl really well all the time.” 

“Oh, good,” he looked around. Birdie  _ really  _ didn’t like how his expression changed- to look  _ pleased-  _ when he realized there was no one else around. “How do we start?” 

“Um, well,” she said, slowly, “It’s twenty dollars per lane per every half hour—”

“Oh, and you close in an hour, correct?”

She cringed inwardly. They were going to want the whole hour and she was going to have to go home late. And potentially get murdered by the tall one that  _ wouldn’t stop staring.  _

He was perfectly silent, too. Why was he  _ silent?  _

“--So we’ll just take the lane for thirty minutes.” The little man dug around in his pockets, produced a twenty dollar bill, and handed it to her. 

She fumbled with the till for a moment. “And your shoe size?” 

The little man looked at her, curiously.

“Um, you have to wear bowling shoes,” she pointed helpfully to the rack of a few dozen pairs of neatly laced shoes. (The new hire had been tending to them all afternoon.) “So you don’t track anything on the floors. It’s two dollars to rent.” 

“Per person?” The man checked. 

“Yeah. Price doesn’t change for the size, though,” Birdie said, helpfully. 

The small man dug in his pockets again and produced a five dollar bill. 

“Keep it,” The man said, waving off her attempt to give him his change. “Is that all we’ll be needing?” 

“That’s all,” Birdie confirmed. “If you need any advice, feel free to ask.”

“Thank you very much,” the man removed his hat and did a little bow. After a second, Crane took the brim of his hat in hand and lifted it up, awkwardly. He looked to the smaller man for reassurance. There was an approving nod. 

“Come along now, dear! Remind me what your shoe size is again…?” 

They linked arms and headed over to the shoe rack, and Birdie could finally breathe. 

= 

“What a nice woman,” Tetch said. 

Crane grunted. There was a polished wood bench that it promptly sat down on, and it reached for its shoes. It was grateful to finally slip out of the hated shiny things, with their topline that was too low and stiffness that hurt its toes. 

Tetch’s fingers fluttered over the shoe tags, looking for the appropriate sizes. His back was to Crane, but he paused, and turned slightly.

“‘You’re thinking about something, my dear, and that makes you forget to talk,’” Tetch said. “‘I can’t tell you just now what the moral of that is, but I shall remember it in a bit.’” 

From the Duchess. Tetch liked using that line, since it was so often applicable with the taciturn Crane. 

“She was afraid,” Crane picked at its silk socks. It liked the feeling of silk, but was wondering if it would like being barefoot even more. “Did you see her eyes, Tetch? So  _ terrified.  _ And I don’t think she even knows who we are.” 

“Oh, dear, really?” Tetch sat down beside it, shoes in hand. “She seemed a little like…  _ Alice  _ to me.” Dreamily, he went on: “ _ Her hair wants for cutting _ .” 

Crane made an angry noise, batting the shoes from his hand; it grabbed Tetch by the front of his vest and shook him.

“Heeper Peeper, chimney sweeper, had a wife and couldn’t keep her. Had another, didn’t love her, up the chimney he did shove her,” Crane spat, furiously. Tetch hurriedly shoved Crane off him and stood up; he took a second to collect himself, then carefully tucked his shirt back into his slacks. 

“Jealousy! Really, now!” Tetch said, indignantly. He stooped to collect the fallen shoes. “Come now. Envy is a terrible color with your complexion.” 

“Alice,” Crane hissed, furiously, with the same inflection as a curse. “‘I weep for you,' the Walrus said: ‘I deeply sympathize.' With sobs and tears he sorted out those of the largest size, holding his pocket-handkerchief before his streaming eyes.”

“Excuse me?” Tetch asked, outraged. 

Crane glared, and thumped its own chest empathetically.

“ _ What,  _ dear?” 

Crane curled its fingers and left long scars in the wooden bench. It growled, but the hottest flame of its wrath seemed to have cooled. It looked more  _ upset _ than  _ enraged  _ now. 

Tetch, after a moment, sat down beside it. He took a deep breath, ignored the ferocious caterwauling of the Red Queen in the distance, and told himself firmly that Crane had difficulty talking through no fault of its own. 

“Would you like to talk about it?” 

Crane glared at him, resentfully, and shook its head. 

“Later, or not at all? Nod for later, shake your head for not at all.”

A nod. 

“Alright. Later, then. Would you still like to bowl?”

Crane shot a glare at the girl up front, who was watching them.

“She is  _ not  _ Alice,” Crane said, voice choked with barely-disguised animosity. 

“Oh, dear, you  _ are  _ jealous,” Tetch reached for one of its hands, with a slight smile. “Were I not a gentleman, I would be tempted to tease.” 

Crane bared its teeth. “I'll not pinch her ears nor tread on her paw, lest I should provoke her to use her sharp claw. I never will vex her, nor make her displeased: For pussy don't like to be worried and teased.” 

“I am only  _ kidding,  _ dear. No woman could replace the spot you hold in my heart.” 

That softened its anger. It reached for the shoes, still in Tetch’s clutches, and its spidery fingers made quick work of the laces. 

It trod a few experimental steps in the new shoes, then turned back to Tetch, who was beaming brightly. 

“I daresay it doesn’t quite go with your outfit. Or mine, either, for that matter,” Tetch said, “But rules are rules.” 

There was a vigorous nod.

Neither of them were particularly very  _ good  _ at bowling _ ,  _ but the mood stayed light and lively the whole time; there was congratulations for an excellent throw (the only strike for the whole thirty minutes was from Tetch, who gleefully hollered “Callooh! Callay! O  _ frabjous  _ day!” and playfully jostled a begrudgingly applauding Crane) and mock-insults (Crane picked up a habit of yelling “MISS” at maximum volume when Tetch threw, and the first time, it startled him enough to very nearly drop it on his foot) and genuine celebration when the first game was over. 

The woman up at the front, Birdie, cautiously approached them afterwards to offer some advice. Tetch, who could see the impending thunderstorm brewing underneath Crane’s hat, did his very best to not imagine her in a silken dress and with soft, honey-blonde hair… In fact, he kept a running list in his mind of all of her features that were not conducive to being Alice, all the while she was explaining bowling stances. 

_ She has freckles. She has brown hair. She has green eyes. She’s definitely too young to be romanced by an old thing like me. Alice’s skin is much lighter.  _

“See, so you want to kind of stand with your shoulders like this—”

The Cheshire Cat was lending its support, too; staring, half-way interested, from the countertop. In a slow, lazy voice, hardly cognible against the barrage of information Birdie was saying and the list Tetch was crafting, the Cat swished its tail and declared, “Definitely not Alice.”

“And when you take the first step, you have to swing with your arm like that—”

Crane, meanwhile, was seething. It knew  _ Alice,  _ and this woman was not Alice. (Crane had seen pictures of her in Jervis’s books, and somewhere, dimly, it knew that Alice wasn’t real; there were memories wedged in the cracks of its mind that smelled like old paper, felt like soft grass, and tasted of cream. While difficult- impossible- to explain  _ why,  _ it knew, instinctively, those sensations meant Alice was not real; the same way if someone looked at something that was blue, they would know “oh, it’s blue”.)

Even if she  _ had  _ been Alice, though, that would not have entitled her to Jervis’s attention and affection. Crane had  _ fought  _ and  _ bled  _ and spent  _ countless hours  _ winning Jervis’s favor, and  _ no one—  _ not Alice, not Batman, not the Arkham doctors, not  _ anyone—  _ could pry that from its grasp.

No one except Jervis himself. And  _ that  _ was what Crane was—

_ Afraid  _ of.

Oh, it did  _ not  _ like feeling scared. It did not like that Jervis held power over it. 

It wanted all of this to just  _ go away.  _ Her, the alley,  _ all of it.  _

Her voice drummed too loud in its skull and the lights were too bright and it took  _ so much restraint  _ to not lash out at her; it was trying to articulate, to say the words “go away”, but they would not come no matter how hard it turned its mind to reach them. 

Crane’s screeching brain settled on one simple declaration: Jervis would not love her when she was  _ screaming in fear.  _

Tetch noticed the change in demeanor. The crooked, twisted stance that became an anticipatory hunch. Crane’s fingers, which had been restlessly beating at its sides, no longer stirred. 

“Excuse me,” Tetch said, to Birdie. “I’m afraid I must be going, but thank you for your assistance. Crane, dear, I think we must be getting along now.”

The touch was very gentle, ghosting across its forearm; emboldened by the lack of a negative response, Jervis took hold of its wrist and gingerly pulled. There was no response, physical or verbal. 

The first few steps were heavy and awkward; then Crane seemed to realize itself, and slid into its odd, light-footed gait. They made it the dozen or so feet to the shoe shelf.

“Let me get your shoes for you, dear,” Jervis said. 

With no warning, Crane pivoted on heel, broke away from Jervis’s grasp, and lunged for Birdie— 

— then promptly stopped, frozen with its fingers outstretched and arms wide.

“Dear, please take your shoes off and put them back,” Jervis massaged the spot above his right eye in annoyance. Crane’s arms sank to its sides, and it slowly turned to face Jervis. Its posture was different; it stood ramrod straight, muscles rigid, perfectly still. After a moment, it marched itself to the bench.

The poor bowling alley employee stared in horror, her mouth still slightly agape. 

“Oh, I’m very sorry for any trouble we may have caused,” Jervis told her, apologetically. 

“Um— why did he—?” She was staring at Crane, who was robotically unlacing its shoes. 

Jervis went right along as if she hadn’t said anything; he sat down beside Crane and begun unlacing his own sneakers. “My dear Crane has been behaving so  _ oddly  _ lately!” He admonished, as if he were a gossiping grandmother. “I find wisdom from good sources, though. ‘Speak roughly to your little boy, and beat him when he sneezes: he only does it to annoy, because he knows it teases.’ Quite applicable.”

The woman made a half-baked excuse and scuttled back to her counter. Jervis got the impression she was about to call the authorities, and figured they had best leave. 

He had time to think, though. And think he did.

It was an  _ exceptionally  _ good decision to have sewn a 10/6 card into Crane’s dress hat. He had felt terrible for it at the time— such feelings of  _ guilt,  _ and thoughts like “who am I to take control of the poor thing’s mind at my own whim?” or “if Crane finds out, it’ll be  _ very  _ upset with me” and similar thoughts of the kind, but Crane behaved so sporadically and it was so  _ nice  _ to have  _ complete and utter control—  _ to make things  _ perfect—  _

He could imagine the voice of his therapist at Arkham probing him about these feelings, and he  _ didn’t like it _ . He knocked his fist against his head, as if to jostle the thoughts out. 

The card had potentially saved that woman’s life, and saved the two of them a potential trip to Arkham. Wasn’t that enough proof that the card  _ had  _ been a good idea? No matter how much of a betrayal it  _ felt  _ like? 

Crane put its own dress shoes back on.

“Come along, dear. Back home. I’ll make you some nice tea and we can put you in clothes that suit you better.” Tetch coaxed. “You can have a nice rest, and when you wake up, you’ll be in a less foul mood.”

Tetch slung his arm around Crane’s waist and they walked out together. 

Nine hours later, just before dawn, Crane stirred in its tangle of blankets and rolled onto its back; Jervis was sound asleep nearby, snoring into a stuffed rabbit. 

Crane shuffled closer, curling its arms around him; it couldn’t  _ quite  _ remember how it’d gotten here from what it last remembered at the bowling alley, but that was alright. 

Jervis was  _ warm.  _


	7. Drake

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Drake is frustrated that he has to stay in the Batcave.

A gloved hand ran, slowly, over a chin with a raggedy scruff of stubble.

There was a man, sitting in a comfortable chair, in front of a massive console. There was a multitude of glowing screens in front of him, all featuring a different display.

One was a police radio- with a live audio transcription- that hummed with just as much activity as the rails of Gotham’s metro. There were speakers alongside the transcription, but the audio was, at the moment, muted. Key words from the radio flashed in red; _Batman_ and _Joker_ briefly shone crimson before the stream of white words swallowed them up.

Another was a security feed from Arkham Asylum, slowly panning through dozens of white-walled corridors. Criminals were mostly dark, bedridden shapes in the gloom; though some had their faces to the glass, trying to talk quietly to their cellmates while everyone else was asleep.

Some of the cells were empty, and the next monitor said exactly which ones.

It was a tremendously large display of mugshots, highlighted in green or red light. There was well over two hundred images, about one fifth of which were highlighted in red. Jonathan Crane, Jervis Tetch, Waylon Jones, Joker, Otis Flannegan, Garfield Lynns, Kirk Langstrom, Victor Fries, and Arnold Wesker were among the number of red-patterned escapees, alongside countless others who had managed to get away in the most recent mass breakout.

It had been a hard fight simply to get it to a fifth on the board. The arduous effort of Batman, Red Robin, and Nightwing had put away Poison Ivy, Spellbinder, the Clock King, the Penguin, Black Mask, Calendar Man, the Tweedle Cousins, Two-Face, Harley Quinn, Kiteman, King Tut, and many more already.

But crime was a hydra. For every criminal put in Arkham, two more appeared to take their place.

The man at the computer lolled his head back, the vertebrae in his neck crackling like broken twigs. He groaned.

Another man- this one far more lightly built, and with a frankly better fashion sense- approached him.

“I can’t help but notice, Master Drake, that you are here instead of out patrolling,” The well-dressed man said.

“Yeah, well, Bruce wants me working on this instead, Alfred,” Drake said, gloomily.

Alfred’s upright posture straightened even more, if that were possible. “I’m afraid I’ve been out of the loop, Master Drake. Working on what?”

“Well, while Dick gets to kick Penguin in the nards, I get stuck with the cuckoo clock.”

Alfred raised an eyebrow.

“Y’know, the nuts.”

Alfred raised his other eyebrow.

“Ugh. Bruce wants me to piece together some non-existent evidence on the nuttier crooks that broke out, which basically means I sit around here until I can conjure an insightful thought out of my ass and divine where, I don’t know, _Firefly_ would be.” Angrily, he went on: “Bruce won’t even let me _leave the cave_ for it.”

“Forgive my saying-so, Master, but you cannot blame Master Bruce. You’re still healing.”

The wounds that marred Tim Drake’s face had turned from bloodied gashes into healthy pinkish tracts, but they nevertheless lingered, and there they would stay for a while yet.

“What, just because one of us gets injured we’re not allowed in the field anymore? Literally name _any_ bone Bruce hasn’t broken. Take your time.”

“Why don’t you tell me what you have so far?” Alfred asked, ignoring him. “Perhaps I may be of assistance. I am in so many _other_ regards.”

The joke wiped away Drake’s scowl. “Right, okay. I’ve been running separate case files for different people, but the one I’ve got the most on is Crane and Tetch; they haven’t been _subtle,_ exactly. But what they’ve been _up_ to doesn’t make any sense.”

“Doesn’t make sense? Fellows like them, I wouldn’t expect it not to.”

“They’ve made lots of public appearances with no… _motive._ Bruce interviewed this cashier at this bowling alley who showed him footage of Crane and Tetch just… _going bowling.”_

Alfred’s face showed a half-second of incredulity; then softened. “Did they pay?”

“The weird thing is— _yes._ Oh, God, I’ve watched the footage like ten times and it’s just so _odd.”_

“Enlighten those of us who haven’t seen it.”

Drake turned in his chair, fingers blurring over the keyboard in front of him. A second later, footage was pulled up on the largest monitor. The camera quality wasn’t great, and the angle was odd, but it was quite clearly an employee demonstrating bowling techniques to two well-dressed men. The shorter, Tetch, was listening raptly, while the taller, Crane, stood there. Crane’s hands were fluttering uncontrollably at its sides before they abruptly stopped. After a moment, Tetch grabbed it by the arm and steered it over to the shoe rack; then it turned on heel, lunged at the bowling alley employee, and stopped dead.

Tetch and the employee talked a little, and Crane moved back towards the shoe rack. It and Tetch took off their bowling shoes, put their dress shoes on, and simply left.

“How odd,” Alfred leaned forward, rubbing his chin. “You said Master Bruce interviewed her? That’s unlike him. He’d normally leave that to the police.”

Drake’s gloved fingers traced one of the gouges over his eyes. “He really wants Crane and Tetch caught.”

Alfred glanced at Drake, a sympathetic grimace on his face. “You mentioned an interview?”

“I’ve listened to it so many times I could practically give it to you word-by-word,” Drake thumped the back of his head against the chair’s headrest. “Ugh.”

“Humor me, Master Drake.”

With a few keystrokes, Drake brought up the audio file.

Bruce’s quiet bass rumbled through the speaker system, then the employee’s low, nervous pitch.

_Ba: Excuse me, Ms… Birdie?_

_Bi: That’s m—  Holy shit, you’re Batman. *nervous chuckle* Um, wow, can I get a selfie? My girlfriend always wanted to be a superhero, you know—_

_Ba: I’d like to talk to you about what happened at Pennypack Creek Bowling Alley yesterday._

_Bi: Oh, I already gave my statement to the cops—_

_Ba: I know. Would you mind answering a few more questions?_

_Bi: … Can I get a selfie if I do?_

_Ba: There may be lives at stake, ma’am._

_Bi: Okay, forget the selfie. What do you want to know?_

_Ba: The two who entered the bowling alley— I know you gave the police the tapes and your testimony, but I want your opinion, not the facts._

_Bi: Um, I’m— I’m not the analytical type._

_Ba: That’s alright. I’m just looking for angles the police haven’t covered. I saw that you tried to tell the police that the two were acting strange—_

_Bi: *scoffs* The cops shut me down when I was getting to the important part._

_Ba: Important part?_

_Bi: It_ seemed _important to_ me.

_Ba: What was it?_

_Bi: Listen, you may not get this- Because you’re, um, a guy, and also Batman- but I’ve had people hit on me before, right? And I have a girlfriend. Her name is Willow, and she’s really sweet but has a hard time, like, communicating sometimes. It’s, um, due to personal stuff. But I’ve known her so long that I can tell when she’s upset that guys are flirting with me. *pause* I- I’m sorry, this probably doesn’t sound very relevant._

_Ba: I asked for your opinion. Go on._

_Bi: The tall one- I think the cops called him Scarecrow?- gave me the same vibes Willow does when some big dick is trying to bother me at the bar._

_*long pause*_

_Ba: That’s… interesting. Was there anything else of note?_

_Bi: I, um, told the cops all I knew—_

_Ba: I know._

_Bi: —Well, except— not that they’re corrupt or anything— I just don’t like cops, as a rule— *stammering* —And I was a little stressed at the time, you know, because Scarecrow was trying to lunge at me— and I didn’t want to have to go to the police station and talk to the cops more after—_

_Ba: I’m not the cops._

_Bi: Well, yeah. I can see that. Okay. Um, I may have noticed a little more than I told the cops. I’m sorry, I was panicking when they visited, I didn’t think it was important until I told Willow about it later—_

_Ba: It’s okay. Take a moment. Collect your thoughts._

_Bi: The short one- Hatter- said the taller guy was acting strange. Stranger than usual, I guess. I don’t know. Is any of this actually helping?_

_Ba: Not as much as I had hoped. But more than you might think._

_Bi: Sorry. If it helps at all, they were coming from the west and left heading east— though I guess I told the cops that t—_

_Ba: That’s all I’ll need. Thank you for your help._

Alfred made a slight _mmm_ sound, staring at the transcribed text before him. “That’s curious. Her description of the miscreants seems to imply—”

“— that they’re more than just partners in crime.” Drake said, sourly. “I’ve been saying it since the first time I fought them. But no-o-o, Bruce just tells me to “ _keep it professional”_ like _I’m_ the one being an idiot.”

Drake stood up in frustration, his cape billowing behind him. “The only thing I learned from this interview was that I’ve got no chance with this chick. That’s seriously it! Jesus Christ, I am going to lose my mind as bad as Scarecrow if I have to stay cooped up in here studying kooks for one more minute—”

Every monitor on the Batcomputer lit up all at once, flashing a red bat symbol superimposed over a black background. An urgent klaxon blared.

Drake swore and slammed his hand down on a button, hurriedly throwing his mask on; Alfred moved backward a few steps.

“Batman to Batcave. Batman to Batcave.” Bruce’s voice was sharp and contained. Drake _knew_ that voice. It was his “oh-god-one-of-my-sidekicks-is-dying” voice; it turned Drake’s stomach.

If something happened to Dick—

“Batcave is receiving you, Batman,” Drake said. “Red Robin is in the nest. What’s up?”

“I found a rat,” Bruce said, tersely.

There was a pause.

Tentatively, Drake ventured, “... Uh-huh—”

“With a note,” Bruce elaborated. “Otis Flannegan’s handwriting and signature.”

“Who is that, again?”

“The Ratcatcher. He’s a low-level crook with a telepathic control over rats. So far, no charge has been able to stick to him. But he’s still dangerous.”

“Oh, right, him,” Drake did a quick check of the villains board. “... So you intercepted one of his rats?”

“It wasn’t intercepted. He _sent_ it to me.”  

“Why the hell’d he do that?”

“To give me this message.”

“Master, _do_ take us out of suspense and tell us what it says,” Alfred cut in, voice crimped and urgent.

“I’m sending you a photo. I’ll keep the channel open, but I have a scene to investigate. Batman out.”

The call icon shrunk to a fraction of its size into the corner of the screen, and a second later, a neatly unfolded note scrawled on torn notebook paper appeared on the monitor.

TO THE DARK KNIGHT:

I VERY MUCH HOPE YOU WILL BE CONSIDERATE WITH MY BABY ONCE HE FINDS YOU. HIS NAME IS SCAR, AND HE LIKES WATERMELON, IF YOU HAVE IT.

IF NOT, HE HAS A LOVING HOME TO COME BACK TO WITH LOTS OF MELONS WAITING, SO THERE WILL BE NO GREAT LOSS.

THIS LETTER MAY BE CONSIDERED A PROPOSAL OF PARTNERSHIP; I THINK WE CAN BE FRIENDS. ARE BATS NOT JUST DARLING RATS WITH WINGS?

( THEY AREN’T AND IF SOMEONE SAID THAT TO ME I WOULD BE VERY… BOTHERED. BUT MY POINT REMAINS. )

I WANT TO BE A SNITCH. YOUR SNITCH— lIN EXCHANGE FOR PROTECTION.

( RATS GET EVERYWHERE, YOU KNOW. I WILL BE USEFUL. )

[Drake had to scroll down at this point, to see a second image, which was the back half of the letter.]

AS A SIGN OF GOODWILL, I WILL TELL YOU THAT I RECENTLY ATTENDED A HOUSE PARTY WITH KILLER CROC, FIREFLY, SCARECROW, THE MAD HATTER, THE VENTRILOQUIST (AND SCARFACE OF COURSE) AND, MOST INTRIGUING OF ALL, JOKER.

HE WAS SHOT IN THE STOMACH BEFORE ALL OF US COULD HEAR HIS PROPOSAL, BUT HE WAS THE ONE WHO CALLED THE MEETING AND HE HAD BIG PLANS IN MIND. I THOUGHT ALL OF THIS MAY BE OF INTEREST TO YOU.

HOPEFULLY WE’LL KEEP IN TOUCH!

OTIS

An address was scrawled underneath and circled a few times. Drake did a quick search of the Batcomputer’s maps, memorized the route there, and sprinted towards the vehicle bay.

“Where are you going, Master?” Alfred called. “You said Master Bruce prohibited you from leaving the Batcave.”

“Screw him! If Joker’s been shot, _I_ wanna see the body myself!” He was already putting on a motorcycle helmet. “And we _both_ know that once this goes public _somebody’s_ going to be very active, and Bruce can’t deal with that himself.”

Alfred hesitated for a moment while Drake straddled his Batcycle.

Eventually, the butler said: “Very good, sir. I’ll sneak you your favorite when he grounds you again.”

“Thanks, Alfred.”

And then he was off.

Alfred turned back to the Batcomputer, running his hand lightly over the multi-buttoned dashboard.

He made a small little _hmph_ sound, then sat down in Drake’s newly vacant chair. He placed his hands on the keys with a little flourish, and set to work in Drake’s stead.

“Note—” Alfred murmured under his breath. “The Mad Hatter and Scarecrow seem to have forged a much stronger partnership than initially thought…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy tax day. And fear not; after this we will returned to regularly scheduled hattercrow content.


	8. Breakfast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A conversation about feelings ensues over breakfast.

“Dear.” 

Crane reluctantly stirred when an elbow jostled its ribs. 

“Dear, you’re squeezing me,” a reproachful voice told it. 

Crane did not want to let go. 

“Couldn’t get up in the mo-orn-ing.” Crane mumbled. 

“Dear, you are going to suffocate me,” Tetch complained. “And then who will make you tea?”

Tea, yes. Crane liked tea. The delightful silty powder that made it sleepy… the warm tea-cakes and the little crumbs that it sponged up off the table-cloth with a licked finger… The copious honey… 

It nuzzled its face against the back of Tetch’s neck, and reluctantly unlocked its arms from around him. 

Tetch did not immediately move; perhaps relishing, the same way Crane was, in how unbelievably  _ comfortable  _ he was. Crane’s blanket mound had been freshly washed, and still had the clean smell about it; no matter in which direction one squirmed, there was always a pleasant warmth to combat the airy cold of their home; and the company was, of course, excellent as always. 

Tetch moved. Crane, as instinctively as a kitten swiping at a laser pointer, threw its arm around him. 

“Dear,” Tetch said, patiently. 

Crane withdrew its arm. 

“Thank you,” Tetch said, graciously. He sat up, with a tremendous yawn, and rose to his feet. 

Crane’s nest was up in the loft of their warehouse residence; once upon a time, it had been an office for some important person, but for now, it held Crane’s things. 

There were holes for windows, though the glass was missing, and the door was mysteriously absent. That mattered to neither of them. Privacy had little meaning at this point. 

Tetch moved to the doorway, and Crane turned onto its belly, blearily looking up at him. 

The Hatter cleared his throat. “‘The time has come,’ the Walrus said, ‘To talk of many things: Of shoes— and ships— and sealing-wax -- Of cabbages—and kings -- And why the sea is boiling hot -- And whether pigs have wings.’”

Crane stared. 

“Come down for tea when you’re feeling well, dear. I think we need to have a discussion.” 

And then Tetch vanished from the door; for a moment, Crane could hear his besocked footsteps retreating down the catwalk, but then they were gone. 

Crane was appalled. The morning had been going so well, up until the part where Jervis started talking.

_ That _ was its first mistake. It shouldn’t have let Jervis talk if he was going to say things like that… with his strange warm tone, but words and posture that were cold. 

Dread clawed its innards as the events of yesterday slowly came back to it. Crane did not remember anything after lunging at the girl. Which was odd. Memory gaps only happened if something VERY BAD— 

— there was a nightmarish flash of information as Crane’s mind shook a memory loose, and the recollection of the smell of manure, tremble of failing muscles, and the pain of cut, swollen knees came back, before it could slam the memory closed by mentally screaming  _ Hush Little Baby _ — 

— Memory gaps only happened if something very bad had occurred. Perhaps Tetch had screamed at Crane when it tore open her throat. Perhaps it had accidentally hurt Tetch in the struggle. Perhaps… Perhaps  _ anything.  _

It did not want to get up. It  _ dreaded  _ rising.  _ Dreaded,  _ when it was the  _ master of fear,  _ the  _ lord of terror,  _ the  _ king of screams _ —! 

It resented Jervis in that moment. Hated just as ferociously as it loved. There ought to be nothing that could evoke  _ fear  _ forth from the Scarecrow, but here it was, curled under the covers and trembling. 

It would need to face him, as all fears would need to be faced, and set him straight. 

It tried to mentally articulate its thoughts, for rehearsal before it went down for breakfast. Jervis’s control over its emotions was unacceptable, and would need to be stopped. 

However, when Crane tried to think of  _ words,  _ they flitted from its mind like greased minnows. It tried harder to concentrate, tried to put key ideas together.

FEELINGS, HURT, JERVIS. It wrestled the words to the floor of its brain like a greased pig, pinning them with all its strength. 

And in a moment, when it tried to reach for further thought, the pig broke free and bolted away. 

Crane covered its face with its hands, rolling onto its back and whining audibly. Planning was worthless like this. It was upset and anxious, and that never did good things for its already miserable concentration. 

The smell of food coaxed it out, in truth. Its stomach grumbled and it realized it had been quite some time since it had last eaten; perhaps a light lunch yesterday afternoon. 

It crawled out of its nest, unsteadily stood up, and paused a moment. It had a large hoard of  _ things  _ that were piled around the blankets in a defensive ring: ceramic cat statues, stray mittens, dishes and spoons, replicas of English churches, stacks of dirty, torn books, small coins neatly arranged in rows, the occasional animal bone, and on the very top, strewn clothes that Crane hadn’t bothered to put away since the last time Tetch did laundry. 

It dug through the hoard for a moment, closed its hands around a small object, then hurried out of the room. 

It walked over the catwalk and down the rickety steps to the warehouse floor. Tetch had begun breakfast. The smell of bread made Crane’s mouth water. 

“Oh, dear, I had half-worried you wouldn’t be coming. Sit, sit!” Tetch called, setting down two toast-laden plates in their proper places.

Crane crawled into its chair and curled up defensively, resting its head on its knees and feet on the cushion. 

Perhaps as a reassurance, Tetch’s hand brushed affectionately against the back of Crane’s head as he walked past on the way to his own place. Tetch sat, shifted to get comfortable, and poured himself some tea. 

“Alright, dearest. I will need you to try your very hardest to talk. We’ll go slow.” Tetch said, kindly. Crane did not trust his voice; it was the sick sweetness of it, like a  _ doctor _ who was trying to scheme something out of Crane. “You’ve been acting strange.” 

Crane scuffed at the tablecloth. There was a dark memory trying to surface in the back of its mind, like worms in a flood. It ruthlessly stomped on those worms in yellow-rubber rainboots. 

“Not long ago, dear, you kissed me. And now you attacked a woman just because she was talking to me!” The accusations were leveled lightly, but no less damning. 

“Wasn’t me,” Crane blurted. “Couldn’t be.” 

Tetch’s brows shot up, and the facial expression he made caused Crane’s throat to clamp itself shut, tacky as the clay on a drying lakebed. 

_ “Pardon?”  _

Crane writhed in its seat. 

Tetch’s expression gradually relaxed, and he reached for his teacup. “I am  _ concerned,  _ dear. I wouldn’t do this if I weren’t concerned for you.” 

Fireworks burst in Crane’s mind, and it flung itself to its feet, slamming awkwardly against the table. 

“You have— dominion over me. This is unacceptable.  _ Unallowable.  _ I am the Scarecrow!” 

“Dominion, dear?” Tetch did not so much as set down his tea, despite Crane’s outburst. 

“Yes, yes, yes!” Screeched the Scarecrow, pounding on the table. The ceramic plates rattled with each contact of its fist. “I am  _ afraid!”  _

That  _ did  _ make Tetch set his cup down. 

“Afraid, dearest?” 

“You cannot leave me!” The Scarecrow howled. It flung itself up onto the table, childishly kicking aside anything that happened to be in the way as it marched straight for Tetch. It knelt in front of him, aggressively shoving its face in his: “You cannot! Cannot!  _ Cannot!”  _

Tetch seemed slightly taken aback. 

“Dear, if you do not sit back down and behave civilly, there will be problems,” he threatened, once he found his voice. 

The Scarecrow seized him by the front of his nightshirt and leered in his face. 

“He loves me,” Scarecrow rumbled, one hand reaching for the item it had taken from its treasure trove. A vial of fear gas glistened in its spidery fingers, waiting to be sprung free. “He loves me not. He loves me—”

Tetch forcibly removed Scarecrow’s hand from his shirt, ugliness contorting his features. 

“You will go back to your seat and we will talk like adults, or I will card you, dearest. And I do ever so hate to do that.” 

The two stared at one another, stuck in a stalemate. 

Crane broke it first. It hunched its shoulders, put the vial away, and turned, half-crawling over the table to return to its seat. 

It sank back into its chair, posture tight and guarded.

There was a long silence. 

Crane reached for its toast and nibbled on it without breaking eye contact. Tetch drank through his cup of tea, poured himself another, and finally, sighed. 

“The sun was shining on the sea, shining with all of his might. He did his very best to make the billows smooth and bri—”

Crane interrupted him. “The moon was shining sulkily,” it growled, “Because she thought the sun— had got  _ no  _ business to be there after the day was done.”

Tetch scowled. Crane’s stomach twisted and it anxiously chewed through another piece of toast. 

“What is the  _ matter  _ with you? Are you ill?” Tetch’s remark started harsh, stinging like a slap, then softened to a caress. 

Crane shook its head. 

“Alright. Let’s talk about…” Tetch’s face lit up with a sudden realization. “What you’re  _ afraid  _ of. You could always talk about fear better than anything else. Spare me nothing, dear.” 

“I do not want to be alone. I am  _ scared  _ of being alone.” Crane managed. “Peter Peter pumpkin eater, had a wife but couldn’t keep her. He put her in a pumpkin shell and there he kept her very well.”

Crane motioned to leave its seat, agitated, but didn’t quite expend the effort to get up. 

“Dear, I have always  _ willingly  _ stayed at your side. You don’t need to be so aggressive, really!” Hatter admonished. 

“Allllliiiiiiicccccceeee,” Crane hissed, corrosive hatred spitting from its tongue. Mockingly, it went on: “I am a pretty Dutch girl, pretty as I can be,  **be,** **_be,_ ** and all the boys in the baseball team go crazy over ME, ME, ME.” 

Hatter’s face began reddening. “‘Alice did not at all like the tone of this remark!’”

**_“ALICE!”_ ** Scarecrow screamed, in a fit of rage that had it flinging a plate across the room, where it smashed against the wall. It leapt to its feet, pounding its fists on the table again. Hatter, too, was unable to keep his composure; he jumped up, glaring. 

“I have had about enough of you—” Hatter’s hat was on the table, and he picked it up with a slight flourish. “Screeching like a toddler! You are an  _ adult!  _ Maybe a few days as a puppet will teach you not to scream at—”

Scarecrow pulled the card off the back of its neck, where Hatter had slipped it when pretending to give Crane a friendly pat to the head. 

There was deathly silence. Scarecrow put the card on the table. 

“Dear,” Tetch said, weakly. 

Scarecrow’s lip curled up behind its mask; the grin was broken and ugly. 

“Don’t be upset, dearest.” 

The vial of toxin was placed on the table. 

“Sometimes you are a handful, dearest,” Tetch defended himself, edging away slightly, as if it would save him. “I thought…” 

“I told myself many years ago that I didn’t think you were an interesting subject,” Scarecrow spoke over him as if he hadn’t even started talking. “But I— I am enjoying that look on your face. The same way you would enjoy seizing my strings when I do not do what you like. The difference is I can admit it to myself.” 

There was a long silence. They glared at one another, but yet again, Crane was the first to break. It slumped in its seat, evidently drained of speech. 

“Toast,” it said, finally, glancing at the plate that had shattered against the wall. A sad, half-eaten piece of bread lay on the floor, surrounded by ceramic shards. 

“Would you like me to make you more?” Tetch said, crisply. 

“Yes.” Crane reached for the toxin and Tetch stiffened. It liked the brief dart of fear in his eyes. It wanted to pursue that, to tear him to little tiny shreds in an oversized coat and top hat… 

But again, there was that little niggle of… conscience? There was something in Crane’s miserable little soul that whined and cried. That liked attention more than terror and would rather lose its life than lose Tetch’s  closeness and the relationship that’d been forged by sweat, tea, terror, and blood. 

It put the toxin away. It wanted toast. 

Tetch, sensing Crane’s new docility, got up and began preparing the bread. They had jury-rigged a toaster a long time ago- Tetch had some practical electrical engineering skills- and routinely swiped loaves of bread from various stores all around Gotham to keep a fresh supply. 

“Dear,” Tetch said, gently, in a tone of voice that made Crane feel strangely…  _ melty…  _ “We can talk about Alice- really talk about her- if you can swear you will try to keep from being upset. Alright?” 

Crane nodded, stiffly. Tetch swept away from the homemade toaster and, with permission (granted with a nod), poured Crane tea.

Crane tasted it. The bitter undertone was not disguised by malt and honey. 

Opium. Crane  _ liked  _ opium, though Tetch used it very, very sparingly. Their supply was small; it was harder and harder to get in this day and age with the prevalence of stronger substances. 

But still, there was nothing quite like the feeling of hands rubbing your back while the whole world…  _ floated off.  _

Whether it was to keep Crane docile or intended as a peace offering was indeterminate. Crane didn’t care either way. This whole rotten day could go die; Crane would very much like to head upstairs and sleep all day, maybe with its head in Tetch’s lap while he stroked Crane’s scalp… 

(Under the influence of opium, it was a pleasure unlike any other.)

“You’re jealous,” Tetch said, delicately. That jarred Crane out of its opium pondering, and its eyes snapped to his with a glare. Tetch did not backpedal. “Of Alice.” 

Crane hunched in on itself slightly. It did not want to reply. 

“I told you, dear, there is space in my heart for you that even Alice cannot take.” Tetch hesitated a moment, then gave Crane a gentle, reassuring rub to the shoulder. 

Crane reached out for him. The words would not come, so it would pantomime. 

Tetch allowed Crane to take hold of him and place its hands on his chest. The robe he wore was thin and gauzy— slippery, even. 

(The sheer joy of the pleasing texture and the soft solidness of fat and muscle underneath almost made Crane forget its purpose; but it kept it together.)

Crane curled its fingers over Tetch’s heart, mindful of its nails. 

“Mmmmmmmine,” Crane glanced up to see if Tetch understood. 

He was staring still. 

“Mine,” Crane repeated, louder and more urgently. “Mmmmm _ jervis _ . Me, me.” 

“Dear, you’ll have to forgive me, but I don’t underst—”

Crane grabbed him and dragged him forward. Tetch’s bulbous nose rammed into Crane’s cheekbone, and his overbite meant that their teeth came together with a nails-on-a-chalkboard clink. 

Nevertheless, Crane persisted. There was a kiss, or an attempt at one, for a solid ten seconds; then Crane let go and pulled away. 

Tetch’s mouth tasted like sucking on an old teabag. 

“Mine,” Crane said, tremulously, with a high growl in its throat. Somewhere along the line, it had begun to shake. It trembled like a leaf in the wind. Fear, anticipation, anger. If Jervis did not reciprocate— If Jervis would rather chase  _ Alice—  _

Cranehadfoughtbledhurtkilledforhimandhewouldrejectit?No!nonononononotFAIRcranelovedhimhatedhimsomuchanditjust—

“Oh! Dearest, I had no—” Tetch guffawed, and that stung worse than anything. “You love me!”

Crane had the toxin in hand in less than half a second. It was a way to fight back against laughter and what would come after. It didn’t want to believe Tetch would ridicule it, but it felt hot and flustered and  _ terrified—  _

“This changes things, oh dear. Now my head’s spinning and my heart’s a-flutter—” Tetch’s laughter was light and soft. Not cruel. Not mean. “I, silly me, hadn’t even thought you could be in  _ love  _ with anything other than  _ fear!”  _

Crane opened its mouth to stammer something in its defense. 

“No, shh-shh, you don’t need to justify yourself, dearest! The signs were there! This poor hatter is just very, very dense!” 

Hatter turned his head to look at nothing, a vacant smile afixed to his face. “Of course, Haigha, but the poor thing is shaking so badly! I think he should have a place at the tea-party. Dormouse agrees with me— or he would, were he awake.” 

The toaster buzzed, and Hatter went to fetch their toast, loudly bubbling to no-one and swinging his head from side to side. 

Crane was confused. It kept fingering the nozzle of the toxin, waiting for Jervis to deny its feelings and request they keep things as they were.

(Would that be so bad? No. Crane would just have to keep him away from Alices… The only terrible,  _ terrible  _ thing that could happen would be Jervis deciding to leave Crane  _ for  _ Alice... ) 

Hatter set the toast in front of him. “Oh, do be quiet, Haigha! You can be so unreasonable this time of year.” 

He pet Crane’s head gently, this time without leaving behind any unwanted stowaways, and headed back to his own place at the table. 

After a moment of arguing with no-one, Hatter turned back to Crane, eyes bright with fervor. “I am  _ sooo  _ very sorry to have been ignoring you, dear. Try the toast.” There was a pause. “It’s the best butter, you know.” 

The toast was not buttered. 

Crane tried it, regardless. 

“Is it good?  _ Frabjous.  _ Now, onto other matters— you should be eager to hear that I love you too, dearest!” Jervis declared, through a mouthful of toast. “Though I warn you I only left jail not long ago- shush, Haigha, it knows- and I’m often away running messages for the King.” 

Crane couldn’t even parse what he was saying anymore. It stopped listening after “I love you too, dearest”, because that was affirmation of  _ I have eyes for you and you only.  _

“I love you too, dearest” said  _ I will not leave you, and you needn’t fear that you won’t be loved by me.  _

And that was all Crane needed. 

 


	9. Ratcatcher

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Batman has a date with Joker, then Otis Flannegan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for animal torture, though it’s not incredibly graphically described.

“I  _ knew  _ you cared.” 

The door shut with a hard thump; then whirred with the click of multiple mechanical locks. The man who’d just walked through it did a quick once-over, then turned around.

The armored costume was unmistakable; casual observers and close friends alike knew the cape and cowl, and if it needed to be any more transparently obvious, there was a logo smack dab in the middle of the chest. 

Batman strode silently through the room and stopped at Joker’s bedside. 

“I knew you couldn’t help but visit,” the clown said, beaming brightly. He looked worse for wear; dark circles ringed his usually bright eyes, his hair was in scraggly tangles, and the sickly weakness that radiated from the recently hospitalized came off of him in waves. 

There was a blanket pulled up to his waist, obscuring his legs; his scrawny abdomen had been papered with bandages that were only slightly bloodied. Joker looked clammy, and more pallid than usual, if that were possible. 

He had been restrained. His wrists and biceps were locked in place with secure straps, and his ankles, knees, and waist had been buckled down. There were no less than three security cameras in the room, all of which rigidly glared down at the clown’s hospital bed. It was indeterminate whether it was to make sure Joker wasn’t misbehaving, or whether it was to protect him against the wrath of any vengeance-seeking caretakers. 

The room was completely empty, save for the bed, an IV stand, and the necessary monitoring equipment. There was no touch of color or life to the room; it was as sterile, Spartan, and impersonal as humanly possible. 

“I read your medical reports,” Batman intoned.

“That sounds like the kind of boring thing you occupy yourself with,” the Joker agreed. 

“They called a Code Omega for you.” 

“Hah! You think  _ I  _ know what that means?” Joker smiled at him, sardonically. 

“You almost bled out.” 

Joker’s grin dropped. Through grit teeth, he spat: 

“None of them would raise a finger to help me when I was dying right in front of them! I had to threaten Wesker with that stupid doll—”

“You should’ve picked better friends,” Batman cut him off. 

Joker threw him a look of absolute scorn. “So should you. That Todd kid sang like a b—”

Batman’s hand drifted towards the IV stand, fingers gingerly caressing the line feeding into Joker’s arm. The clown fell silent, eyes following his hand. 

Batman did not need to say anything for his threat to get across. Joker’s eyes met the Dark Knight’s, and then the clown looked away, concedingly. 

“I know about your meeting.” Batman drew his hand away. 

“So?” Joker asked, petulantly. “Lots of meetings happen. Are you going to interrogate Lex Luthor whenever he talks to his board? Ooh, or, better yet, Bruce Wayne? There’s no such thing as an ‘ethical billionaire’, you know. They’re the real criminals, if you ask me.”

“I didn’t ask,” Batman said. “Who was at your meeting?” 

“Scarface and his meat-puppet. The crocodile. The one who looks like a raisin that got left in the sun too long. Oh, and I guess the one with the rat fetish.” 

“Which one of them shot you?” Batman asked.

“Oh, it’s sweet of you to ask, but I can handle it myself. Or at least get Harley to do it for me. Poor girl. She tried to send me flowers, but they wouldn’t bring them in.” 

“You’re deflecting,” Batman said. “Which one was it?” 

“Do I need to call the nurse?” Joker asked, raising his voice, slightly.

Batman glared down at him. “The Mad Hatter and the Scarecrow were there, too. I noticed you conveniently forgot about them.”

Surprise flit across the clown’s countenance, which then darkened. “Good-for-nothings. They all would’ve let me die. You want the  _ truth,  _ Bats? I don’t know  _ who  _ did it. That’s the truth.”

“I don’t believe you.” Batman told him, calm and measured. “The bullet I recovered was from a .22, and you would’ve had to have been in close proximity with the shooter.”

“My back was turned.” Joker scoffed. 

“The bullet entered through your front,” Batman said. 

“I was in lots of  _ pain,  _ Bats!” The Joker half-wailed. “I don’t remember! Pity! Woe! I have to spend  _ weeks  _ in this dull place before I’m hauled off to Arkham, which is only  _ slightly less  _ clown-torturingly boring!” 

“You know  _ exactly  _ who shot you, and you wouldn’t hesitate to rat on  _ anyone,  _ Joker. What’s the difference this time?” Batman pressed.

“Maybe I shot myself, smarty-bat,” Joker seethed. “Maybe I’ve got grander plans! Grander schemes! Maybe I’m orchestrating  _ another  _ breakout in Arkham, and I needed to take suspicion off me, so I shot my own kidney out!” 

“You’re not stupid enough to shoot yourself for a scheme.” 

“You don’t know that,” Joker shot back. “In fact,  _ Dork  _ Knight, I’d say you don’t know much of anything right now.” 

Batman stood there for a moment, lips pressed in a thin line. 

Joker grinned, triumphant. “I’m  _ crazy,  _ Bats. You don’t know what I will or won’t do for a laugh.” 

“We’re done here.” Batman turned around, cape billowing as he made for the door. 

“Ta-ta, Bats! If you see the Todd kid, hit him with a crowbar for me!” Joker jiggled his hand in a mock-wave. 

The locks clicked open, Batman stepped through the door, and it closed behind him. The locking mechanisms sounded off one-by-one, with a certain finality about the last.

The pair of guards posted at Joker’s room stepped out of the Dark Knight’s way, giving him a respectful nod. They then resumed the blank, thousand-yard stare of someone who only had their thoughts to occupy themselves with. 

Batman pressed his finger to his ear and headed down the hallway. 

“Batman to Batcave.” He said. 

_ “Sorry, sir, this is an Applebee’s,”  _ a voice informed him. 

“Red Robin?” Batman demanded. “You’re not supposed to be on the line.” 

_ “Oh no! This isn’t my bedroom! This is the Batcave! How did I make  _ **_that_ ** _ mistake?” _

“Red Robin, go upstairs and put Robin o—”

_ “You couldn’t pay me to talk to that creepy little brat,”  _ Drake told him, dismissively.  _ “And anyway, Dick took him out on some recon a half-hour ago.”  _ There was a second of pause, and then he added:  _ “Before you ask, Alfred’s getting groceries. It’s just me! Darn.”  _

“I still grounded you.” There was an elevator and a set of stairs at the end of the hallway. Batman took the stairs. 

_ “I am  _ **_seventeen_ ** _ and three quarters! You can’t ground me, I’m almost an adult!”  _

“Key word is almost, Red Robin.” 

_ “Whatever! It’s either me running your tech support or no one. Barbara’s celebrating a cousin’s birthday or something with her dad, so there’s nobody left if you want help.”  _

_ “Fine.  _ I need an address.” 

_ “Whose?”  _

“Otis Flannegan— the Ratcatcher. He’s our best chance of getting an accurate account of what happened at the meeting Joker called. He’s proven himself willing to talk to me, and he has a legal residence.”

_ “Oh, speaking of that meeting thing—  I haven’t made any progress on Scarecrow, or Hatter, or Croc, but there was a Firefly sighti—” _

“How long did you stay grounded for?” Batman asked, frustrated. “I told you that you were off-duty for a  _ week.”  _

_ “Bold of you to think I even went to my room. Here’s a protip: next time you ground someone, don’t do it over the phone.”  _

“But  _ someone  _ was supposed to—”

_ “Alfred brought me a pillow to prop up my feet on while I went through forensics from the house.”  _ Drake said, smugly.  _ “I have Flannegan’s address, if you want it.”  _

“Yes, I do.” 

Batman moved his hand from his cowl and half-hurried down the stairs. A concerned-looking staffmember was there to greet him, but he breezed past her without so much as a word. 

The Dark Knight pushed through the double doors of the hospital, mid-afternoon sun shining down on him. The Batmobile was parked in the lot, glittering in the light, and a few curious pedestrians hurriedly scurried off as he drew near. 

Batman’s entire aesthetic was not conducive to sunshine, but sometimes working during the day couldn’t be helped.

Batmobile’s hatch slid open; Batman jumped in and drove off. 

=

Otis Flannegan’s apartment carefully toed the boundary between Gotham’s extreme poverty and extreme wealth; it sat on a small block sandwiched between poor residential tenements and the shorter of downtown Gotham’s skyscrapers.

Batman climbed out of the Batmobile and set out on foot.

_ “So— you didn’t say how your meeting with Joker went. And I’m guessing you won’t let me see him.”  _

“No,” Batman said curtly. 

_ “... Is this a Todd thing? If it’s about Jason, I’ll stop being annoying about it.”  _

“Do that.” Batman recommended. 

_ “I promise I’ll stop, Bruce, but I want to know how Joker is.”  _

“He’ll live.”

_ “Hmph. Unfortunately.”  _

Batman declined to comment. 

Flannegan was on floor 3, apartment D. A quick trip up the stairs and a journey down a plain hallway lead the Dark Knight to an unremarkable door with a faux-brass plate so tarnished it was hardly legible. 

He knocked. 

There was a long pause, then the door creaked open as much as a chain-lock would allow; Batman got the brief impression of a dark face, even darker hair, a beard, and civilian clothes before the door was hurriedly shut. 

“Sorry! Sorry, I didn’t know you were coming,” Otis’s voice was muffled behind the door. “Just a minute, just a minute.” 

Batman stood there. Patiently. He weighed the idea of Otis trying to run or fight, but the  _ letter  _ told him otherwise. Otis was genuine in his desire to become an informant; undoubtedly in exchange for  _ protection,  _ both from the criminals he ratted out and the law. 

That could be arranged. He and Catwoman had a similar…  _ understanding.  _

“Call ahead next time!” Otis chided through the door. “Goodness, where did I put my glo— Thank you, Grey.” 

It took two minutes, maybe three, before his locks clicked and the door swung open.

Ratcatcher was no longer in civilian clothes; he had on a long green coat, brownish-orange leather chaps and gloves, thick boots with heavy treads, and a series of straps and belts across his chest. A gas mask was buckled around his head, small edges of skin and a mop of dark curls peeking from underneath it. 

“This is my work outfit,” Otis explained, fidgeting slightly. “Do come in. I wasn’t expecting company, but I keep a clean house. It wouldn’t do for the rats to get sick.” 

He had a soft, hypnotic voice, like an off-putting kindergarten teacher; his demeanor was obviously nervous, but the inflection of his words remained smooth and rhythmic, almost  _ dissociative.  _

He stepped back to let Batman in. 

The apartment was unlike the rat’s nest Batman had been expecting. It was slightly under-furnished and clean, with no obvious hoarding problems or criminal items. It was brightly lit for a felon’s home, and did not have the usual smell Batman would associate with rats. 

The strangeness was only apparent with a second glance. There were a few strewn pet toys, and every single raised surface had a rope, ladder, or ramp leading up to the top of it. On the floor, right next to the pony wall that divided the kitchen from the living-room, there was a long, shallow dish of water, and besides  _ that _ , a tray of fresh fruit and vegetables. It did not escape Batman’s notice that there was a slice of watermelon with a few nibbles taken out of it. 

Dozens of tiny, beady eyes glared out at Batman from everywhere. Snouts loomed at the top of a bookshelf, little paws were visible from beneath a table, and tails protruded from the gap in between a drawer and the floor. 

“I was making dinner,” Otis explained, heading further into the apartment. Batman had ventured in, but stayed by the door. He closed it quietly behind himself. “For me and the rats. They’re a little leery of you, or they would be eating, but it’s  _ alright, _ babies.” His voice turned to a saccharine croon: “You can come out! He won’t bother us.” 

He glanced back at Batman. “I hope.” 

The rats melted away from the walls like living shadows, rapidly pattering towards the tray. On their way, they occasionally turned their heads back to look at Batman and distrustfully flick their whiskers. 

After the first dozen or so, Batman lost count. 

“I’m not here to put you in jail, if that’s what you’re worried about.” Batman finally withdrew from the safety of the door, following Otis further into the apartment. 

“Oh, good. Don’t get me wrong, rats are very capable and resourceful animals, but the idea of my sweet little honeybees having to get by without me…” Otis tensed so hard it was a miracle he didn’t break something.  _ “Stresses me greatly.”  _

“I can see that.” Batman very considerately lifted his cape to allow a small rat to rush to the food tray. 

Otis headed through the open doorway to the kitchen and lifted the lid on a simmering saucepan. Immediately, the warm, lush aroma of sauce and spice wafted from underneath, trapped again when Otis set the lid back on. He gave a few idle stirs to a pot full of boiling water and some kind of noodle, and turned back to Batman. 

“I take it you’re here about my letter, Dark Knight, though I  _ don’t  _ recall giving you my address.” Otis sounded slightly disapproving. The rats’ squeaking and soft chomping diminished considerably, like eavesdropping students whose teacher had just gotten a juicy-sounding phone call. 

“All of your records are on the books. It makes you easy to find.” Batman said. 

“Well.” Otis pursed his lips. There was a silence, as Batman waited for him to say something, but he didn’t. 

“Your letter,” Batman prompted.

“Oh, yes. My letter. I was completely candid in it. That night at the meeting, while watching Joker bleed out in front of me— it was the first time I’ve ever seen a human die before! And it made me realize something.” The Ratcatcher began fidgeting with the tips of his gloves.“Being solely a criminal is  _ dangerous.  _ For me  **and** my rats. So it won’t hurt playing for both teams.”

“Being an informant is also dangerous.” Batman told him. “Even moreso, in some regard.”

“Oh, yes, but I can be slippery when I like. The whole world is my safety net, Batman. Everywhere I go there are hundreds- thousands- of furry little friends who would take me in. Hunting me down when I don’t want to be found is hard, but shooting me when I attend a meeting and leaving me for dead is very, very easy.”

“Become a hero, then,” Batman urged. He placed a hand on the pony wall, and reached out for Otis, who flinched back like he was about to be hit. “You don’t  _ need  _ to be a criminal, Otis— there are others like you who have seen the errors of their ways and become better. Plastic Man—”

“I am  _ sure  _ that there was a ‘No Proselytizing’ rule at this complex,” Otis joked. His hands were trembling so badly that he could hardly even hold his stirring spoon. Batman was consciously aware of the fact that the rats had stopped eating, and had fallen into a deathly silence. “Please respect my wishes, and let’s keep conversion off the table.” 

Had it been  _ any other  _ one of Batman’s rogues, he may have gotten more physical with Otis; held him by the front of his coat and insisted that Ratcatcher stay on the straight and narrow, at risk of getting assaulted and thrown in Blackgate, maybe even Arkham. 

But Batman could count the number of times he had personally talked to Ratcatcher on a single hand without using all his fingers, and he was not yet irredeemable. He had not killed anyone, assaults were at a minimum, and with some therapy, he could make for a good public defender like O’Brien. 

“Fine,” Batman conceded. “I want a little information, to prove you’re dealing in good faith.”

“Wasn’t my letter good enough?” Otis exclaimed. “I told you about the meeting! I gave you the address!” 

“I need more.” 

Otis’s glove creaked around his stirring spoon. “Are you going to hurt me if I don’t tell you?”

“No, because you’re going to tell me.” Batman said, as soothingly as he could manage. 

“... Okay, ask. Ask, but I may not know. My little ratties can only tell me so much.” His head snapped away from Batman, back to his stove; he hefted the pasta pot and hauled it to the sink, where he poured it into a strainer. 

“I need  _ every  _ detail you can remember about the meeting, Flannegan.” 

“What’s relevant?” Otis asked, hurrying back to the saucepan. He dragged a spoon through the stuff, and watched as it slowly oozed back into place. “I don’t know what parts are important to you.”

“All of it,” Batman told him. 

Otis glanced at him, then at his pasta. “Well... You don’t mind if I eat while I talk? I’ll have to take off my mask; I know it ruins the criminal part, but I guess if you really wanted to see my face, you could look up my Instagram. It’s Ratca—” 

“I don’t need to see your Instagram, and you can eat.” Batman told him. 

“Oh, that’s good. I had a job interview today, and I lost my appetite, so this is the first chance I’ve had to eat all day.” 

“You had a job interview?” Batman asked, watching him get out a set of paper plates and Tupperware. Rats seemed to simply  _ appear  _ on the counter from nowhere, fetching silverware and plastic lids for Otis. 

“A custodian at Wayne Enterprises! I’m not going to get the job, most likely, but you have to be job-hunting for unemployment checks.”

Batman made a mental note in the endless laundry list of mental notes to talk to Lucius about talking to someone lower down to ask  _ them  _ to talk to whoever had interviewed Otis, and pull a string or two if Otis’s natural charisma didn’t land him the job. 

“Forget I asked,” Batman said. 

Otis headed out into the living room (the kitchen was too small to sit down in) and sat down on his tiny couch with a plate of pasta and salad. He indicated Batman could sit down if he liked, which he did not. 

The rats began crowding the additional space on the couch, climbing on top of one another and cuddling up in massive piles. 

“I’ll start from when I got the invitation,” Otis began unbuckling his gas mask, which he set aside. He was a young, swarthy man of maybe twenty-five, with a neatly trimmed beard and green eyes; he began scarfing down pasta nearly as soon as the mask was off. “Which was around a week ago—”

=

Otis Flannegan jerked awake with a start, dislodging the rats that had been sleeping on him. He muttered hasty apologies and shuffled out from beneath the sheets, trying not to unduly disturb anyone, and staggered to the bedroom doorway in the dark. 

He had a  _ premonition  _ of some sort, like something was wrong.

He stumbled into the living room, where his costume was strewn about; He collected his pants from the floor, stuffed them on, and groped around in the dark for the rest of his things. Once it was on, the weighted leather of his uniform was like a safety blanket, giving a reassuring hug all over his body. 

Sharper-minded now, he headed into the kitchen, poured himself a glass of water, and drank it. 

Otis buckled his mask on, grabbed his staff from where he kept it propped up against the wall, and left his apartment, careful to lock the door behind himself. The premonition came to him stronger now— and now he realized it was not a  _ premonition,  _ it was the desperate crying out of distressed rats. 

Otis had been following the sensation at a trot, that hastened to a jog, which then became an out-and-out sprint. His stomach was lurching tremendously. They were scared. Those poor, poor little rats were  _ terrified.  _

_ I am coming,  _ he tried to tell them.  _ Someone is coming to help you.  _

He received the bleak, black sensation of terror in reply. 

Those five minutes of running at maximum speed were some of the worst moments of his life. Anxiety became a black hole in his chest, chewing through rational thought, growing larger and larger. 

The source was a dark, abandoned-looking storefront. It wa

=

Otis froze up, swallowing a mouthful of noodles. 

“What?” Batman probed, gently. 

“I may have done something illegal,” Otis admitted. “But you didn’t hear those poor little rats, Batman! This couldn’t wait!” 

“Go on. This is confidential, Flannegan.”

= 

s a decrepit-looking place, the kind of place an upstanding person would not willingly step foot in.

Otis smashed through a window with his staff, then leapt in with a shower of glass. The rats were so close by, and their emotions were so  _ intense,  _ that it was getting harder to think like a human.

There were rows and rows of empty shelves, and the dust was so thick that he would’ve been coughing without his mask. Otis grabbed a flashlight from his belt, switching it on and peering around the gloom.

_ I’m here,  _ Otis cried out to them.  _ I’m here! You’ll be safe now!  _

“Well I’ll be,” A voice said. “It actually worked. I thought the boss was nuts when he—” 

Otis spun around, staff held threateningly aloft. There was a wall of muscle given human form who stepped out from behind a shelf. 

“Where are the rats?” Otis demanded. “What have you done?” 

“Calm down a li’l, enh? I don’t care about the rats, an’ really, neither does the boss. They were the cheese for our trap.”

“Trap?” Otis stepped back, and realized that what he felt behind him was not a shelf. He spun around, and found himself wedged between two incredibly rough-looking toughs. 

“Yeah, trap. Fortunately for you, mac, it ain’t the kind that breaks your neck.”

Otis was, frankly, beginning to worry for his own safety more than the rats. 

“We’re s’posed to give you this,” one of the toughs dragged Otis forward, stuffed a crumpled piece of paper down his coat collar, and shoved him back; he collided with the other tough, who knocked him to the ground. “And tell you that if you don’t show, it’s gonna look like the Black Death for rats in this city. Now, take your stupid shitty vermin and leave. We gotta burn this place down an’ see if it’ll get Firefly to show.” 

Otis got to his feet again, and there was a surge of torrential hatred in his stomach; he  _ knew,  _ that with the tap of his staff against his ground, he could summon every rat in Gotham to eat these two alive— 

_ But he didn’t.  _ Instead, he squeezed between one of the toughs and a shelf, and hurried into the back of the establishment, where he could feel the rats’ terrified anguish the strongest. 

What he found there was nearly enough to cause him to break down; as soon as he caught a glimpse, he let out a strangled yell and bolted forward. 

This part of the store had been cleared to make way for the hellish contraption that had baited him here. There was a tremendous wire-mesh cage, suspended on two large poles; it was situated above a roaring  _ fire,  _ and there was a mass of rats inside so densely packed that they could hardly move. 

They were being  _ cooked alive.  _

The rats were squealing and screaming, writhing in one solid brick, biting at one another and clawing to get away from the worst of the heat. The fire spat and hissed like fat was being dribbled on it, but Otis  _ knew  _ what it was, and it was  _ nauseating.  _

_ “O mo chreach! Dè rinn iad!?”  _

Otis frantically ran his hands over the cage, looking for a latch; the rats stopped moving as soon as he got near. He could  _ feel  _ them, pitifully begging for him to help; they shivered, placidly, waiting for him to free them. 

He found the latch, on the top, and flung it open. Rats poured out by the dozens, streaming out and down the poles and disappearing into the shadows. Once the volume of rats had diminished somewhat, Otis fumbled in his belt pouches for his equipment. Although his hands were shaking so badly he could barely hold them, he grabbed a pair of pliers and cut jagged holes for more rats to escape from. 

Once the last had finally gotten away, he dropped to his knees and put his face in his hands, swallowing a rapidly rising tide of bile.

He had no idea how long he was sitting there for; but after some time it occurred to him that those two men had to  _ pay  _ for this. 

Otis stood up and prowled through the store, all but  _ inviting  _ them to jump him again. There would be nothing left but bones, and even  _ those  _ he would snap into fragments to feed the rats the succulent marrow—

And then he realized the building was on fire. 

_ Hard to breathe—  _ he thought it was the usual difficulties caused by the gas mask, but he was strangely lightheaded. 

_ Hot.  _ He hadn’t even noticed, but it was sweltering, now; the leather was sticking to his skin and his back burned like he’d been standing out in the sun for an hour in harsh summer. 

_ Dark.  _ He hadn’t realized— it wasn’t  _ gloom _ , it was smoke. 

He panicked, and lost his sense of direction in the dark; he dropped to his hands and knees, and while he would like to say it was because he knew smoke rose to the ceiling, it was because he felt more like a rat. 

_ Oh God oh God oh God the building’s on fire where the hell’s the way out?  _

Otis will admit weakness in that moment; arguably, his strongest ‘ability’ was being able to take control of a rat’s mind, fully and completely taking its will into his own hands to make it do whatever he pleased. 

But this time was different.

This time he gave  _ himself  _ over to the rats. 

His mind was nudged out of the way to make room for another, simpler, but no less powerful will. 

Everything was chaotic, impossible to discern, like someone was playing with the remote for his brain and couldn’t decide whether to fast forward it or slow it down. Not being in control of his own limbs or movements was  _ disconcerting,  _ but it was distant, like he was uncomfortable for someone else. 

His mind resurfaced when he leapt through the window that he’d broken earlier; he tumbled, hit the pavement with his boots, and was suddenly was in control of himself again. 

Shaking, panting, and completely shellshocked, Otis did the only thing he could think of:

He went home. 

He had a very cold shower, Googled symptoms of heatstroke and CO2 poisoning, checked himself for burns, and curled up on the couch surrounded by sympathetic rats and slept until noon. 

When he woke up, he forgot about the events of the night prior for a half second; then they came down on him like a vengeful hammer. 

He did not move from where he lay until one of his rats (Sleek) brought him a Ritz cracker, which he ate. 

He sat up, and his mind was torn between  _ oh my god what the fuck was that you almost died, those rats were tortured because of YOU  _ and  _ well, just another day at the office,  _ which was a disconcerting split. 

Then he remembered the letter that’d been stuffed in his coat. Without being told, one of the rats waddled off and fetched it, ridding Otis of the concern-slash-hope that he’d lost whatever it was.

Otis took it from the rat (Star), uncrumpled it, and read, in printed text: 

YOU’RE INVITED! 

MARCH 20TH 7:30 PM

414 NORTH FAIRWAY STREET, GOTHAM, NJ

BE THERE OR BE SQUARE!

=

“Do you still have it?” Batman asked. 

“I do,” Otis said. He glanced down at a particularly large rat with a long bald patch due to a scar; it scurried off the couch and into the other room. “Can you go into the kitchen and get the ice cream out of the freezer? It’s got to thaw a little before you get at it. I broke a spoon the other day.” 

Batman stared at him for a moment, wondering if he’d forgotten who he was talking to; despite the subject material of his story, he looked more and more comfortable the longer he talked, and wore a vacant, faraway smile. 

He probably didn’t get the chance to talk to anyone very much. 

Batman got his ice cream out of a mostly empty freezer (the only thing other than a tub of ice cream was small fruits frozen in ice cube trays… rat treats, or so Batman hoped) then returned to stand beside him. 

The scarred rat had returned with the letter in its teeth; it scurried up Otis’s pant leg and perched on his knee, holding the letter out. Otis took it, then handed it to Batman. 

As promised, the crinkled letter read exactly what Otis had said it would.

“I’d like to keep this,” Batman said. 

“That’s fine by me,” Otis ate the last forkful of salad on his plate, and swallowed. “Where was I? And are you sure you don’t want to sit?” 

“I think I do,” Batman said. He dragged over a chair from where it was tucked underneath a small table, and sat. “You had just looked at the letter.”

“Ah, yes, that’s ri

=

_ ght,  _ Otis thought to himself.  _ How badly could this possibly go?  _

He had arrived early, though he was not in a particular hurry to get there. Dread knotted his stomach on the whole walk through the abandoned subdivision; he held his staff like a lifeline, and couldn’t help but drag his mind through those of every nearby rat to comb for anything dangerous.

He stopped in front of the house, staring at it for a minute, then glancing away. 

His eyes caught on a two-legged figure approaching; then he corrected himself. Four legs, but two of them were made of wood.

He knew of the Ventriloquist, in a vague, nebulous way; the same way exterminators sort-of knew about rival companies. It was never relevant; just a little detail that had been catalogued in case it came up.

The Ventriloquist was an old, bespectacled man with no discernible chin, wearing a sweater vest and a nervous frown. Scarface’s expression could only be described as wooden. 

“Were you the one who organized this?” Came from the Ventriloquist simultaneously as Otis asked, “Did your goons give me this letter?” 

They stared at one another for a second. 

“Jee-sus, dummy, of course it wasn’t him! I have no idea who this guy even is!” The puppet snapped, annoyed. “Scarface don’t show up for nogodies.” 

“He doesn’t mean that!” The Ventriloquist told Otis, hastily. “I’m sure you’re important to someone.”

“Stop sayin’ that, dummy! I DO mean that!” Scarface roared. “Let’s stop standin’ around an’ get inside.”

“B-bu, but sir, anything could be in there!” 

“It’s empty,” Otis said. 

“Oh yeah? You geen in there, green gean?” Scarface snarled. 

“It’s empty.” Otis repeated. The rats had told him as much. 

Scarface grumbled to himself. “You go  _ first,  _ then.” 

Otis went up the porch steps. The drive was cracked and weedy, and the foundations looked like they were about half-way to rotting. The windows were completely boarded up. 

He pushed the door open; it wasn’t locked. Dust swirled. Otis crossed the threshold and went deeper in, taking the flashlight off his belt. 

“Ohh, I don’t like it,” the Ventriloquist whined from behind him. “Can’t we stay outside, sir?” 

“No!”

The Ventriloquist whimpered. 

There was a long hallway with a few doors; plaster was flaking off the yellowing walls, and one of the doors had a fist-sized hole in it. Time had not been kind to this place. 

The hallway came to a living room; the flashlight beam passed over a host of furniture under long white dust cloths, as if someone had intended to come back under a very long vacation; and for all Otis knew, they still did. 

There was a floor lamp. Otis knew it wouldn’t work, but he tried it anyway. 

The light flicked on and the Ventriloquist quietly shrieked, cringing back; the puppet yelled at him and let loose a hail of ineffective blows, berating him for cowardice. 

Otis looked up at the lamp, befuddled, and tried a light switch on the wall. Ugly yellow bulbs flickered on in the hallway. 

There was still power. In any other circumstance, that would’ve been great, but it dug under his skin and put him ill at ease. 

“I’m going outside,” the Ventriloquist squawked. “The porch, um, the porch looks like it needs sweeping!”

“DON’T TAKE US OUTSIDE, DUMMY,” Scarface raged as the Ventriloquist darted down the hallway. “STOP IGNORING ME!” 

Otis approached the furniture, tugging a dust cloth off the largest shape; it turned out to be an ugly grey couch. From there, he pulled them all off, fancying it a game; what’s under cloth number  _ two?  _

He sat down on an unearthed coffee table, figuring it was the most likely candidate to not be infested with bugs, and checked his phone. 

It was thirty minutes until the promised meeting time. 

Arguing floated through the hallway, and Otis listened to a good five minutes of back-and-forth before they compromised on staying  _ by  _ the door, but not outside. 

Another five minutes after that and Otis became more starkly aware of the rats in the building; they weren’t  _ nervous,  _ but they definitely felt something was off. Otis picked his staff off the floor by his feet; he’d need one of the rats to be closer before he could get details.

At his behest, a dark-furred male leapt up his leg and scampered up his thigh. Its tiny mind informed him of what it knew; its knowledge didn’t come in language, or pictures, but in unarticulateable truths.

Male, large, not old but not young. Smelled like human but not human. 

Rats did not observe things as humans would; it had no need to describe a creature’s colors or demeanor or specific features that they had. To ask a rat  _ does it have hair  _ or  _ does it have brown eyes  _ was asking a human to fly. It simply wasn’t in their nature. 

Otis’s ears picked up the sound of crunching grass. He scooped up the rat and set it on the ground, where it scurried beneath the baseboards. 

The back door’s knob jiggled, then was pushed open. 

Otis recognized the newcomer; Killer Croc was a naked eight foot crocodile that’d grown arms and a halfway decent brain. He eased his way into the house, posture stiff, a duffel bag slung over one shoulder; he glanced over at Otis, and his slitted yellow eyes narrowed.

“Who the heel’re you? Not that I ain’t grateful fer what’cha left in th’sewers fer me, but I like t’limit time spent aboveground.” 

“I didn’t call you here,” Otis told him. 

“Then who  _ did?”  _

“I don’t know,” Otis said. 

Croc grumbled something, annoyed, and shuffled over to the couch. He eyed it for a moment, gave it a light dusting with his scaly palm, and collapsed on top of it. He closed his eyes and seemed to be asleep in moments. 

Otis pulled out his phone. It was 7:12. He put it away. 

At 7:18, after six minutes of scuffing at the carpet, intermittently checking his phone, and communing with the rats, the Ventriloquist escorted a person into the living room. 

He was tall and lanky, wearing a wife beater and jeans, and had a relatively…  _ Horrifying  _ countenance, the kind that was definitely more suited to corpses than living human beings. He wore a bright smile, (although he had no lips, so there wasn’t much choice) and his brown eyes were unfocused and faraway. His bicep was twitching uncontrollably; then his jaw began spasming, and then his eyelids, then all three at random intervals. If it bothered him- or if he even noticed- it didn’t show. 

“Hi! I’m Firefly!” The newcomer immediately marched up to Otis, extending heavily scarred hand. They shook, and Otis felt a pang of guilt for being glad he had gloves on. 

“Firefly,” Otis echoed. The exact words the thugs from a week ago had said to him had faded with time, but he remembered that name. “How did you get your invitation?” 

“This little  _ shop  _ caught fire! I went to take a look, and when I was there, two guys walked up and handed me this!” He shoved a piece of slightly singed paper under Otis’s nose, bearing the same BE THERE OR BE SQUARE tagline as Otis’s own invitation. 

Croc had evidently stirred now that people were moving around; he unzipped his duffle bag, pulled out a bottle of vodka, and went to town on it without so much as a grimace. 

After he’d chugged a good quarter of it, he smacked his tongue noisily against the roof of his mouth and rumbled: “Found a big pile’a meat in th’sewers. Had a note like yers on it.” 

The Ventriloquist fidgeted, and everyone turned to him, expectantly. 

“What’cha lookin’ at him for? He ain’t worth givin’ an invite too. He’s just my plus one.” Scarface barked. “One’a my henches gave the invite to me an’ said it was from an interested party. So here I am. Now,  _ dummy,  _ move it!”

“Yes sir,” the Ventriloquist whined, and hurried back to the front door to wait for the next guest. 

Otis glanced down at his phone, but before he could check the time, he was interrupted. 

“Y’didn’t mention how you got  _ yers.”  _ Croc said, mildly. 

“I was in the building that caught fire.” Otis said, in lieu of a proper answer. 

There was a second’s glitter of sympathy in the crocodile’s eyes, but he looked away and returned to his drink.

Ten minutes ticked by painfully slowly. Firefly had already carefully looked at everything, and was now occupying himself by sitting on various bits of furniture, kicking his feet, standing up, and moving to the next. 

After long enough, Otis couldn’t tolerate rigidly standing anymore. He knelt down by the baseboards, reaching into an emergency pouch full of unsalted sunflower seeds. 

_ I have food for you, babies,  _ he crooned to the nearby rats. They scurried out in small hordes from holes chewed in the baseboards, with twitching whiskers and bright, interested eyes. 

They began to queue up in a neat row, with only the occasional squeak of protest or attempt at cutting in line. 

Only a handful of rats had been able to take seeds before three sharp bangs came from down the hall; the door opened, and the Ventriloquist escorted in the Mad Hatter and the Scarecrow. 

= 

“I had no idea how many people were going to be there,” Otis recalled. “At this point I was—”

Otis stopped talking for a moment; his eyes widened, staring at something past Batman’s shoulder. Instinct had the Dark Knight out of his seat and turning to see what it was in a split-second.

“The ice cream!” Otis leapt to his feet and scrambled past Batman to the kitchen. Cabinet doors fluttered as he hunted for a bowl and spoon. 

“Oh, thank God, it’s only a little melty,” Otis said, relieved, as he doled himself a portion from the tub. “Do you want any?” 

“No.” 

“A drink, maybe?” Otis prompted, sticking the ice cream back in the freezer. 

“No. I’d like to hear about Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter.” Batman said, bluntly. 

Otis carried his half-melted treasure back into the living room, and sat down on the couch. 

“Alright. But I really wasn’t paying attention too much to them.” 

=

Firefly enthusiastically greeted the pair, who seemed slightly uncomfortable with his presence. They escorted themselves to the loveseat and sat snug; Hatter’s feet didn’t quite make it to the ground, and Scarecrow seemed to find it amusing to shake them and watch them dangle. 

It was warned to stop, and that was around when Otis stopped paying attention; they talked with Croc, which sort of half-perforated Otis’s preoccupation with the rats. There was mention of Jason Todd, very briefly, then a lot of silence.

The longer they waited, the more Otis was beginning to think the whole thing was a set-up. His mind wandered in all sorts of unseemly directions: How long it would take to get back home in case they’d decided to go after his beloved housepets? Should he even stay any longer, despite the threat made against Gotham’s rat population? Why  _ this group  _ in particular? Could any of them be trusted? 

Otis stood up and dusted off his legs. The last rat had taken his last sunflower seed, and they’d all gratefully scurried into the dark. He moved back to the coffee table, sat, and checked his phone.

7:38. The person who was supposed to meet them was officially late, by all rules of courtesy. 

“It’s getting to be late,” Otis told everyone; not that he thought they were listening. “I have lots of little babies to get home to, so if this meeting is going to be something, I’d like it to be  _ now.”  _

Croc gave him a sort of half-pitying, half-annoyed look, and shifted on the couch. He dug out another bottle of vodka, then a few shot glasses, which he left on the table for Otis’s enjoyment. 

“Y’won’ feel th’time passin’ a’ter a coupla these,” Croc grunted. He stretched, his tail arching, and turned onto his stomach like a basking lizard. “But I’m wit’ ye, brother. If whatever bossman what call’t us here dudn’t show, I’m gonna piss on’na floors an’ see how he like cleanin’ it.”

The Ventriloquist nervously rejoined them from the front door; he squeezed onto the couch beside Croc, who agreeably moved to make room for him. 

Otis checked Instagram. His latest video of Sleek and Smallpaws was doing well in the app’s  rat community. 

Firefly kept trying to look over Otis’s shoulder at his phone, and after a brief attempt at stopping him, Otis figured it wasn’t worth it and just let him look.

They waited through ten more minutes, until it was nearly eight PM; then a quiet, creeping sense of urgency prickled the back of Otis’s mind. The rats felt someone coming, and they did not like whoever it was.  

Otis put his phone away, folded his arms, and stared at a nearby wall, trying to urge one of the rats out to him. A grey female obliged him- scampering out of the hole in the baseboards- and he picked her up, bringing her to eye level. 

_ Male. Thin. Tall.  _ There was no proper translation for the whisker-twitching nervousness the rat exuded, but Otis supposed ‘ _ badbadbadbadVERYBAD’  _ would be in the spirit of the feeling. 

“Someone’s coming,” Otis said. Heads lifted, and half-asleep men stirred. “A man. Tall. Thin. The rats are scared of him, whoever he is, and I find them to be a good judge of character.”

“A rat toldja all that?” Croc asked, cautiously. His eye opened a crack.

“Yes, they’re very intelligent,” Otis rushed to defend his loves. “And I wouldn’t be throwing stones, Jones, seeing as you’re a sentient crocodile.” 

“I ain’. It’s a skin condition.” 

A little after a quick snippet of banter, there came a knocking at the door. 

The Ventriloquist went to answer it, and there were a lot of uncomfortable sounds. A scream, Scarface yelling, the Ventriloquist’s pleading, and then an ugly thump. 

Everyone moved in a great flurry of motion. Scarecrow stood up, Tetch right next to him, Croc tensed as if to get up, Firefly grabbed the lighter he had been playing with and a can of bugspray, and all Otis could think to do was cradle that poor little rat and flinch back. 

The smell of singing rat hair filled his nostrils, and he could hear their baying squeals; in his nightmares he saw the cage and the firelight dancing in the darkness. 

A shape came through the hallway. It was unassuming in its slightness; a grin split its milk-colored maw. This was the beast that had done those horrible things to the rats— not directly, no, but given the  _ order,  _ which was just as bad. Otis would  _ kill  _ him for it. 

“Oh, it almost seems like you’re all not happy to see me,” Joker beamed around at them all. 

Croc answered before Otis could; he pounded his fist on the table and yelled threats, slashing a finger accusingly in Joker’s direction. 

“So much  _ hostility!  _ Of course I didn’t just gather you all for the giggles!” 

Scarecrow made a disgusted sound in the back of its throat. “Every night when I go out, the monkey’s on the table. Take a stick and knock it off.  _ Pop  _ goes the weasel.” 

The Mad Hatter raised his pistol and shoved his way forward; Joker, not wanting to get shot, did the sensible thing and held up his hands. 

“Hold on a minute,” Joker squawked. “Hear me out.” 

“I ought to shoot you,” Tetch said, stiff-jawed. “It would save everyone a lot of trouble.” 

Otis agreed. He couldn’t help but coo, “The poor babies here would get to eat something. They haven’t had fresh meat in soooo long.” 

“Always wanted t’know ‘f clowns tasted funny,” Jones agreed with a sneer. 

Joker persuaded the lot of them to listen; for at least a moment. Everyone, in varying states of anger and disgust, impatiently listened to his plan for assembling a “freak menagerie” to “ _ really  _ get at Bats”. 

It was the line  _ “spookiest manchild homosexual to ever walk around in burlap”  _ that finally did Joker in. He had pushed them all too far— but the Mad Hatter most of all.

The tiny Englishman’s pistol barked. Joker’s body snapped back as if he’d been punched. Otis yelped and flinched. Firefly nearly fell over. Croc clapped his hands to his ear slits. 

After that, the Mad Hatter and Scarecrow hurriedly departed. The Hatter grabbed Scarecrow’s arm and dragged him out the back door, all the while Joker’s clothes began rapidly staining red with blood. 

Otis watched, but he did not move. Joker looked at them with his bright, wide green eyes, and Otis  _ knew  _ he was going to die, but he was perfectly fine with doing  _ nothing about it.  _ The smell, sight, sound,  _ feelings  _ of the rats in the burning cage would not be forgotten so easily. 

Croc looked perfectly indifferent; perhaps even a little satisfied. Firefly was facing in a completely other direction, waving at Hatter and Scarecrow as they left. 

Joker, seeing that the three of them would not help, stumbled back down the hallway, leaking a gushing torrent of blood as he went. There was a choked half-conversation, half-threatening of the Ventriloquist, who was stammering apologies all the while Scarface kept cutting in to laugh at Joker’s misfortune.

Croc and Otis exchanged a look; they were both fully aware of the murderous  _ wrath  _ that Joker was capable of bringing down on them, and that what  _ would  _ come of it would be exceptionally ugly. 

But that look also affirmed what they already knew: despite the threat, neither of them were willing to compromise on their own personal feelings to help the clown. 

Croc stood up. “‘M gone. Think Wesker jes’ call’t Pyg or somebody t’help tha’ pasty piece’a shit, an’ I ain’ gettin’ cot up’n that.” 

He picked up his duffel; Otis moved to let him past, and the crocodile-man stooped to look him in the eye. 

“Ye need me, jes’ jump down’a sewer drain,” Croc told him, seeming to only be half-joking. Then he straightened and lumbered back out the door. 

“I’m going to go, too,” Firefly burbled. “We should do this again next time!” 

He slapped Otis on the shoulder just a little too hard, and followed Croc out. 

Otis wanted to go look at Joker. With the other two gone, he could hear the wet breathing, the rapid  _ plip-plip-plip  _ of blood droplets, the Ventriloquist’s whiny, nervous mumbles, and Joker’s choked snaps of pain. 

He was morbidly curious. He wanted to see Joker hurting for all of the rats that had suffered. 

But he lost his nerve, and he fled out the backdoor. 

Otis went home, sat down, and drafted his letter to Batman with a cooler head.

“This needs to get to Batman, Scar,” a panicked calm filled Otis; he was in the eye of a storm, a place of perfect peace surrounded by tumultuous chaos. 

He was aware the letter was odd and rambling, and that likely it wouldn’t even be Scar who gave it to the Dark Knight, but he didn’t care. It  _ needed  _ to get to him. 

=

“I heard it all secondhand,” Otis said, apologetically, “But I heard Joker was in the hospital now.” 

“Yes,” Batman said. “He had a criminal doctor called to look at him, but his driver was speeding, presumably on the way back to his operating room. There was a police chase, and after it was over, Joker was taken to the hospital. Your letter was what broke the news to me.” 

Otis’s face colored slightly. “See? I can be valuable.”

“Yes,” Batman agreed. “And you have been. Thank you for your time, Flannegan.”

He reached his hand out to the Ratcatcher, who looked at it in complete awe. After a moment, they shook hands. 

Batman stood up, drawing towards the door of the apartment. Otis trailed after him, a hopeful expression on his face. 

Batman tapped his ear. “Red Robin?” 

_ “Hearing you loud and clear. Jeez, you went radio silent for like, an hour. I thought I was going to have to come get your sorry ass.”  _

“I need you stop any research on the other rogues,” Batman said. “Scarecrow and Mad Hatter are our top priorities now— Hatter was the one that shot Joker.” 

_ “See, that’s convenient.” _

“What’s convenient?” 

_ “Yeah, I just got a report in- as in, was literally reaching for the button to call you when you called me- about those two.”  _

“What  _ now?”  _ Batman asked, voice hardening.

Drake told him. 

Batman opened the apartment door and swept through. Otis pattered after him, though stopped at the threshold. 

“Can I c—”

“No,” Batman barked back at him. “Stay inside. Relax. You’ve earned it. I’ll call on you when I need you again, but not before.” 

Otis watched him go; then turned back into the apartment and, disgruntled, shut the door. 

“I think I like him,” he said to no-one. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is definitely, DEFINITELY the longest; the final count ended up being 8,509 words. 
> 
> Oops?
> 
> ( comments appreciated baby )


	10. Horses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lots of horses in this one.

It was mid-afternoon- maybe even early evening- and Ferris Whittleton, an officer of Gotham’s Mounted Unit, was patrolling uptown Gotham and thinking about what he would do when his shift was over. 

At the moment, he was trying to decide on the merits of take-out food versus cooking his own dinner. How tired  _ was  _ he at the moment? Too tired to cook? No, maybe not. His beat had been easy today. No problems other than little kids wanting to touch the horsey and stupid tourists not quite getting the idea that it’s a  _ police horse  _ on  _ police business.  _ Like, you wouldn’t go asking to pet a blind guy’s service dog, would you? 

“Excuse me!” 

Whittleton did not look up at the shrill voice. It could’ve come from  _ anyone,  _ and didn’t necessarily mean he had to go running after it. If he snapped to attention every time someone yelled across the street in Gotham, he’d have to tear himself in four different directions. 

_ It  _ **_is_ ** _ bullshit,  _ Whittleton decided to himself.  _ They oughta post a sign or something. Lots of signs. Maybe a big banner in the Gotham Airport, or a billboard on the main road in: DON’T TOUCH THE HORSEYS OR THE OFFICERS ON THE HORSEYS. THIS ISN’T A PETTING ZOO, AND I DON’T CARE HOW MUCH OF A GOOD BOY YOUR KID HAS BEEN OR THAT HE WANTS TO BE A POLICE OFFICER WHEN HE GROWS UP.  _

“Excuse me! It’s urgent!”

That  _ did  _ make Whittleton look up— and then down.

There was a tiny four-and-a-half-foot person wearing oversized clothes speedwalking after him; Whittleton thought it was another entitled kid for a half second, but then the mature facial features kicked in. 

Whittleton pulled the reins on his horse, and leaned towards the guy. 

“Something wrong?” Whittleton asked, putting on his best kindly voice. 

“Yes, oh yes, something is wrong! I have an urgent message for the king and I  _ must  _ have your horse!” The man yelled. “‘’I must have two, you know— to come and go. Once to come, and one to go.’” 

_ Drugs,  _ Whittleton determined almost immediately.  _ He’s on drugs. _ It was too early in the day for him to be drunk, and he wasn’t slurring. 

“Sorry, sir,” Whittleton said. “Police horse only. I’m sure ‘the king’ won’t mind waiting on a message too much. Try a cab.” 

“Oh, please! It’s very important!” The tiny man wailed. A few heads were turning in interest at the scene; Whittleton silently cursed his rotten luck. It was never good press when he had to haul a druggie to jail for public disturbance; plus, if the guy got violent, the horse could get hurt,  _ pedestrians  _ could get hurt, and Whittleton wasn’t keen on getting bucked out of the saddle and cracking his head open. 

Whittleton, incredibly patiently, said: “Sir, no. If you want to get somewhere, call a ca—”

Whittleton’s world abruptly lurched. Twiglike arms wrapped around his middle, and before he could say  _ wait what  _ he was dragged out of his saddle and unceremoniously dumped onto the ground. 

He could hear the sound of faint, distant shouting— Whittleton reached for his pistol and a boot came down heavily on his forearm, making him yell and squirm. 

He hit his head, he thought; for some reason his mind was stuttering, choppy and jagged. He commanded his body to move and it didn’t.

Whittleton felt like he ought to be hurting, but the pain hadn’t kicked in yet;  only a swirling maelstrom of confusion and lurching terror. 

Two faces loomed in close. All Whittleton could really focus on was two bright pinpoints of red amidst a sea of darkness. 

“Jack fell down and broke his crown,” A voice said, slow and hypnotic. Whittleton’s next inhalation was labored and painful; he coughed and everything grew more jagged, more fractured. 

Then the  _ nightmares  _ crept in. 

All around Whittleton were demonic figures with flashing teeth and elongated claws, blazing hot and bright; hands burst out of the ground and clamped down on him, then  _ pulled,  _ dragging him down, down, down…

“And Jill went tumbling after!” 

=

The officer began screaming, and pedestrians around suddenly had the self-preservation to scatter. 

The Scarecrow straightened from where it was bent over the fallen man, tilting its head curiously to listen to the garbled screaming. It was just about able to make out “ _ I was a good man I didn’t do it no! NO! LET GO! PLEASE!”  _

The Hatter tugged on Scarecrow’s sleeve, pulling him away.

“The  _ horse,  _ dearest,” Hatter urged. “I really  _ must  _ go. Perhaps you could persuade one of the Queen’s men to give you another one?” 

Scarecrow grunted. “If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.” 

It knelt and cupped its hands to give Hatter a leg up. Gratefully, the little man climbed onto the horse. 

“Ough! What is  _ wrong  _ with this saddle?” Hatter shifted back, then forward, making a face. “There’s a  _ bit  _ in the front.” 

“Western tack,” Scarecrow told him.

“ _ I’ve  _ never seen one like this,” Hatter complained. “But it will have to do.” 

Scarecrow made an apologetic noise and backed away. Hatter dug in his heels, and the horse let out a shrill sound of protest; it began to partially rear, swiftly stopped by the insertion of a 10/6 card in its bridle. 

With its newfound obedience, Hatter urged it forward, and it cantered off down the street. 

Scarecrow watched him go, then turned back to look at the officer. He had mostly stopped screaming now; he was curled in a fetal position and whimpering, holding his face in hands. A small puddle of blood was oozing from underneath his head. 

Scarecrow knelt beside the man, patting around his body for what it wanted; it lifted a radio triumphantly, hit the button, and sweetly crooned: 

“All the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty together again!” 

Gotham had a not  _ inconsiderable  _ amount of officers on horseback; with how crowded Gotham’s streets were (and how bad traffic was) they sometimes were the only practical way to move freely about the city in times of crisis. It shouldn’t be long before— 

Amidst the sound of mass hysteria- screaming people pushing into the street or in another direction, anywhere to get away from the injured officer- a sound tapped into the shadowy corners of Scarecrow’s mind.

Hurried hoofbeats, heading close. A second officer was easy to pick out amidst the panic; he towered above them all, looking for the source. After a quick adjustment of its hat and  fluffing of its straw, Scarecrow aggressively waved him forward, fighting to be heard above the chaos: 

“Officer, officer, he’s hurt! Hurt!” It chanted in falsetto, stabbing a finger at the fallen policeman.

The horse struggled for a second, but the crowd had thinned enough for officer and beast to get through. The officer dismounted, and Scarecrow drew back as if to flee, melting away from the immediate scene. 

“Officer down—” The policeman began saying into his radio. 

Scarecrow dug around in the pockets of its tattered coat and drew up a slender vial of fear toxin, which it threw in front of the officer; it shattered with a spray of glass and a cloud of caustic gas. 

The policeman had just about enough time to draw his pistol on Scarecrow before the fear toxin took hold. 

His shot went wild as he unloaded his entire clip at nothing— The officer screamed, cowering, as some unknown demon caught hold of his mind. 

Scarecrow watched as the officer’s flailing became subdued crying and quiet whimpering; he and the other officer were curled beside one another in complimentary terror. It was beautiful, it was  _ fascinating,  _ and— 

—Scarecrow sternly reminded itself that it needed to follow Tetch, reasoning that these officers would be boring in a few minutes, whereas  _ Tetch  _ was always fun and exciting. 

It walked up to the horse, careful to stand within her line of sight; she snorted at Scarecrow, and it gingerly stroked the side of her face. 

Scarecrow mounted her with one practiced, wide sweep of its leg. As soon as it found its footing, it was taken back to its childhood; its skinny, cut knees hugging the bare back of a mare, rushing wind, the smell of hot grass. 

It violently shook its head, as if to force the thoughts out, and urged her after Tetch. 

=

The denizens of Wonderland were out in force today! 

Everywhere the Hatter went there were hundreds of woodland critters diving out of the way of his horse; they hurled abuse his way, but he was on a  _ mission.  _ He was an urgent envoy of the King, bearing an  _ incredibly  _ important message!

(It was unfortunate, at the moment, that he did not remember who the message was to, nor what was in it, but he was certain that with time it would come to him. Or it wouldn’t. The King couldn’t behead him if he weren’t  **there,** oho!) 

The Hatter’s horse slowed as he focused himself on trying to remember. Maybe it was an invitation for the Red Queen to attend tea. 

No, that didn’t sound right. An announcement for a jousting tournament? A baby’s christening? 

No, no, no. Hmmm… 

Oh, this saddle was  _ uncomfortable.  _ Perhaps the Hatter should’ve tried going it on foot, no matter how much slower it would’ve been… 

“Hatter!” A familiar voice wailed. The Hatter, distracted, turned his head; behind him, rapidly gaining, was a weedy black figure on a cream-colored mare. 

Ahh, that must’ve been the Scarecrow. Dear Scarecrow! Just like Alice, a newcomer to Wonderland; or oldcomer? It had not been born here, but Hatter had known it so long that it really ought’nt be a  _ newcomer  _ anymore. 

But he supposed that was how it went. You could live in a place all your life, but if you weren’t  _ born  _ there, you weren’t  _ from  _ there, not really. 

Scarecrow was a peculiar fellow, too, though Hatter supposed being peculiar was not  _ peculiar  _ in Wonderland! _ We’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad!  _

It looked to be happy on horseback, anyway. It rode its horse like it had been born into its saddle, so smooth and jaunty either of the Knights would be jealous; Hatter noted it had both reins gathered in one hand, and let the other bounce on its thigh in time with each of the mare’s strides. He had never quite seen a rider ride like that in Wonderland before; it must have been a habit Scarecrow learned from wherever it was from. 

The Hatter slowed his gelding to a halt, turning to receive Scarecrow with a smile.

“Hello, dear!” He waved. “I see you managed to convince one of the Queen’s men to part with his horse!” 

Scarecrow responded with a low, coughing cackle. It snapped its head around to look at a fleeing family of pigs, who squealed and shielded themselves with their trotters. 

It leaned dangerously far out of the saddle to throw up its arms and scream like a banshee, which devolved into a fit of happy, shrill laughter when it evoked terrified wails from the fleeing Wonderland denizens. 

_ At least one of us is enjoying himself,  _ the Hatter thought.  _ Ah! but the message!  _

“Dear, come, now! The message!” Hatter called. Scarecrow swiveled in its saddle, gathering up its reins again, and dug in its heels. Its horse started forward, and Hatter commanded his own to go after it. 

“So, dear,” Hatter had to shout to be heard above the wind and hoofbeats. “I have forgotten where, exactly, we were supposed to deliver this message, and to whom! I also cannot seem to remember what it was, either!” 

Scarecrow gestured with its hand to indicate it understood. 

“So I think what we  _ should  _ do is visit everyone of importance and see if they were  _ expecting  _ a message!” 

Scarecrow yelled back: “A wise old owl lived in an oak, the more he saw the less he spoke. The less he spoke, the more he heard; why can't we all be like that wise old bird?”

“WHAT?” Hatter shouted back.

“A WISE OLD O—”

A horse leapt, spectacularly, through a side street; Hatter’s steed stopped with merely a thought, but Scarecrow’s swerved and reared with a terrified whinny, just barely managing to not catapult Scarecrow off. 

“Stop right there!” 

There it was! The unmistakable glinting red armor, the crest that topped the gleaming helmet, the pure crimson stallion and the terrifying presence that seemed to make shadows bend ‘round him and light flee from his figure. 

“The Red Knight!” Hatter exclaimed, as Scarecrow growled,  _ “Bat-Man.”  _

Hatter’s horse stepped back with the slightest suggestion of his mind; Scarecrow’s remained rooted where she was. 

The Hatter began shaking. He did  _ not  _ want to be captured for the Red’s side! He was merely a lowly messenger who may or may not have been carrying vital information from the White King!

Hatter searched for his voice, and stammered: “The miserable Hatter dropped his teacup and bread-and-butter, and went down on one knee. ‘I’m a poor man, your Majesty,’ he began.” 

“Get off the horse!” The Red Knight shouted, tightening his grip on the reins. “Your spree of terror stops here, Scarecrow!” 

He was talking  _ nonsense! _ Clearly, the Red Knight was so enraged he had gone mad!  **_More_ ** mad than usual! 

Scarecrow grinned and dug its heels into its horse’s flank. She spurred into sudden motion, turning in the opposite direction of the Red Knight’s path. 

“Run! Run!” Scarecrow’s battle cry rang. “As fast as you can! You can’t catch me, I’m the  **_Gingerbread Man!_ ** ” 

A chase! 

The Red Knight and his horse galloped past the Hatter after Scarecrow; the milliner watched, frozen for a moment. He now had a decision to make. 

Help the Scarecrow against the Red Knight or finish delivering his message? 

His unconscious mind knew, even if his conscious mind did not. Hatter’s steed tore after the Red Knight and the Scarecrow, mere meters behind the Knight’s horse’s tail. 

=

“I need your horse,” Batman appeared behind the police barricade silently, startling a host of hunkered-down officers.

“Oh, Jesus! Batman!” The police were trying their best to throw up impromptu barricades; squad cars and moveable steel walls had been placed to block major streets, though there was a small amount of room for fleeing citizens to escape through. The Mounted unit had come out in full force, as there was really  _ no room  _ for squad cars to get in amidst the choked traffic and newly restricted streets. “It’s Scarecrow, we heard him over the radio—” 

“I know,” Batman said. “I need your horse, officer.” 

The mounted officer, who was a youngish-looking man, wilted. “I mean, I’d like to give her to you, but d’you know what the sargeant will do to me if my horse goes  _ missi—”  _

“I’ll get her back to you.” 

“I mean, okay, but are you even  _ qualifie—”  _

Batman gave the officer a withering look, and the rider cringed and promptly dismounted, handing off the reins and scampering to the enclave of policemen clustered behind a police vehicle. 

Batman had ridden horses as soon as he could fit in a saddle, at his father’s encouragement, then, later, Alfred’s; as a young adult, he’d reinforced his riding knowledge with training at mounted combat. 

Even now, it was a skill he still kept up when mingling with high-society types. 

So, Batman couldn’t speak for the  _ horse’s  _ ability to withstand a chase through a crowded city street, but _ he,  _ at least, knew what he was doing. 

He mounted the mare and rode off. 

_ “They’ve got a helicopter on Tetch,”  _ Red Robin told him.  _ “He’s keeping to the sidewalk. It’s the 3rd intersection of Bainsborough.”  _

There was a shortcut Batman could take; his horse turned at his indication and obediently galloped past a group of civilians being lead by another mounted officer to safety. 

_ “Scarecrow’s just joined up with Hatter,”  _ Red Robin relayed.  _ “Radio says there’s two injured officers, both fear gassed, and a few people who got some trace inhalation of the toxin or trampled on in all the panic.”  _

“No deaths?” 

_ “Not  _ **_yet_ ** _. But one of the officers had to be rushed to Gotham Central because of a head injury and I think I heard something about injured kids.”  _

Batman dug in his heels. 

_ “Fourth intersection,”  _ Red Robin rattled off, obediently. 

“I’m almost there,” Batman muttered. His horse’s hoofbeats rang out as he turned through a narrow alley, scarcely avoiding a dumpster. A narrow stripe of road stood perpendicular in front of him, gridlocked with a sea of cars and a few stragglers rushing to get away. 

_ “Oh—!”  _

Batman burst forth from the alley, pulling the reins; his mare came to a sudden stop in front of the Scarecrow and Mad Hatter.

The Mad Hatter’s horse all but stopped in its tracks; Scarecrow’s went wild, swinging in a broad arc and trying to buck its rider off. Scarecrow held firm until it settled. 

“Stop right there,” Batman barked. 

“Batman!” Scarecrow spat, as the Mad Hatter gasped, “The Red Knight!” 

Hatter’s horse backed up; Scarecrow’s shoulders drew together, and it leaned forward, aggressively. 

Hatter yelled: “The miserable Hatter dropped his teacup and bread-and-butter, and went down on one knee. ‘I’m a poor man, your Majesty,’ he began.” 

“Get off the horse!” Batman called. Tetch flinched, and Batman got the inkling that the Hatter no longer had a foot in the real world. “Your spree of terror stops here, Scarecrow!” 

The Scarecrow grinned, and its horse turned on hoof and bolted. 

Its mocking voice streamed in the wind: “Run, run, as fast as you can! You can’t catch me, I’m the  _ Gingerbread Man!” _

Batman growled, spurring his horse, who charged after the villain. He spared a half-second of thought for Tetch as he sped past the Hatter; he tapped his ear. 

“Red Robin, is Nightwing back?” 

_ “He’s upstairs with Alfred and Damian.”  _

“Send Robin. Tell him to bring the Bathorse.” 

_ “We have a Bathorse?”  _

Batman ignored that.  _ “Send him,  _ Red Robin.” 

_ “Ugh! I don’t want to talk to him—”  _

Scarecrow swerved into the street, mare galloping over the pavement; its horse leapt over the hood of an abandoned car and kept going. Batman remained in pursuit. 

“I don’t  _ care  _ if you don’t want to talk to him.”

_ “He’s a creepy little brat, Bruce!”  _

“Ti—  _ Red Robin,  _ you have to talk to him sometime.” 

_ “I just get Alfred to pass notes to him whenever I need to tell him something,”  _ Red Robin said, sulkily. 

“I don’t have the concentration to waste on this conversation,” Batman said.  _ “Send Robin.  _ Batman out.”  __

Scarecrow’s newest tactic was turning every single corner it came across and occasionally doubling back just to keep Batman skidding; Scarecrow was a  _ skilled  _ rider. It had firm control and a clear understanding of what its horse was capable of; there were no missed jumps or over-sharp turns, and its gleeful cackling told the Dark Knight that it was treating this more as a  _ game  _ than as anything serious.

“Jack be nimble!” Scarecrow cried, jovially. “Jack be quick! Jack jump over a candlestick!” 

Its horse leapt clear over a parked convertible, hit the ground, and kept going. 

_ “Damian’s on his way,”  _ Red Robin mumbled. 

“Patch him through.”

There was a second of pause, and then the scratchy rasp of a prepubescent trying to sound deep-voiced came through.  _ “I am here, Father.”  _

“Good. I need you to go after Tetch. Red Robin, are you keeping track of—” 

_ “He’s on Brookerridge, Damian, heading east,”  _ Red Robin said.  _ “Bruce, do you want me to call Dick out to help? Or, hell, I could go—”  _

“I need someone to run support, and also I grounded you,” Batman said. Scarecrow veered sharply left, and narrowly avoided winging a police barricade. 

“THE THREE WISE MEN OF GOTHAM,” Scarecrow sing-songed at maximum volume, “THEY WENT TO SEA IN A BOWL.” 

Batman continued: “I have a plan, Red Robin, and Damian catching Tetch is integral to it.” 

_ “I wouldn’t trust him with something so important,”  _ Red Robin cautioned.

_ “I can hear you,”  _ Damian told him, annoyed. 

_ “Yeah, well, eff you, kid.”  _

Before Batman could order them to knock it off, Scarecrow turned sharply into a sidestreet. Batman overshot, though not by far, and had to guide his horse back around to get through. 

He followed the echoed cackling, and they came out into a main street again. 

Batman’s horse was starting to tire; and so was Scarecrow’s, by the looks of things. Batman could see the villain’s steed’s flanks heaving mightily with just the effort of breath, even from a half-dozen yards back. 

This wouldn’t last much longer. 

“Give it up, Scarecrow!” Batman shouted to it. “We already have Tetch, and your horse can’t keep it up!” 

“Liar, liar, pants on fire!” Scarecrow screamed in reply. Without looking back, it hurled a vial of fear toxin at him, which exploded on contact with the ground into a cloud of gas and glass shards. 

It was too late to swerve out of the way. Batman held his breath through the cloud, but his horse caught a lungful of the toxin.

They galloped a few more strides; Batman threw himself out of the saddle, landing hard, just in time for the toxin to take over.

The horse screamed and reared; it fell back and kicked all four hooves, producing horrific shrieks of animal terror as it flailed at an imaginary enemy. It was all Batman could do to get out of the way.

He rose, slowly, and collected himself. He backed a ways away from the horse, and tapped his comm unit. 

“Scarecrow gave up playing,” Batman said. “I need good news.” 

_ “Damian’s almost got Tetch,”  _ Red Robin said, unenthusiastically. 

_ “I have him cornered,”  _ Damian said.  _ “He won’t stop screaming about tea, but I think he’s surrendering, Father.”  _

“He’s hallucinating,” Batman said. “The Hatter from the book was a coward, and he’s fully immersed in Wonderland right now. Tell him if he comes quietly the Red Queen will be merciful.” 

_ “... That seems foolish.”  _ Damian objected, hesitantly.

“Robin—” Batman began, sharply.

_ “Okay, Father… Listen, you— you  _ **_knave,_ ** _ the Queen has spoken! If you come quietly, she will not chop off your head!” _

“Wrong book,” Batman muttered. 

_ “Well, Mother never  _ **_read_ ** _ me Alice in Wonderland,”  _ Damian retorted, snippily. _ “And it’s working, anyway— the Batcuffs are on.” _

“I told you to read it,” Batman said, trying to not sound exasperated. 

_ “It’s for little girls! Why would I need to read it?”  _ Damian objected. 

“For situations exactly like  _ this,  _ Robin, and it’s  _ not  _ for little girls, it’s a well-written historical satirist novel.” Batman took a breath. “Now, do you have Tetch?” 

_ “He’s tied up and over the saddle,”  _ Damian told him, dutifully. 

“You’ve checked him for weapons?”

_ “Yes, Father.”  _

“Good. Bring him and his horse to my location, it’s—” 

_ “-- Aberdale, a little ways north of where you are, Damian.”  _ Red Robin finished for him. 

It took a few minutes, but the familiar glossy, raven-black shape of the Bathorse and another chestnut-brown steed came trotting down the street. Tetch was cuffed and slung over the Bathorse’s withers. His eyes were shut tight; his hat had been smashed flat, and sat, crumpled and dejected, on the hatter’s head. He looked as though he were mere moments from weeping. 

Batman looked over the chestnut. It was another police horse; sturdy-looking, dependable. It was skittish at the moment, turning its head slightly to stare at the squealing, writhing horse caught in the grip of Scarecrow’s toxin. 

Batman mounted it with a little difficulty. 

“Tetch is our bait. Don’t lose him, no matter what,” Batman said. 

“He isn’t going anywhere, Father,” Damian replied, solemnly. 

“Good. Red Robin, where did Scarecrow go?” 

Static crackled for a moment.  _ “It looks like he’s going back to, uh, Bainsborough?” _

“It’s looking for Hatter,” Batman determined. “Let’s go.” 

The speed was slower, less urgent, when heading to Bainsborough. The Hatter mumbled half-sobs, half-excuses, begging to not be taken to Arkham again. 

Tetch moaned, “‘He’s only just out of prison, and he hadn’t finished his tea when he was sent in,’ Haigha whispered to Alice: ‘and they only give them oyster-shells in there!’”

Damian raised his hand as if to strike his captive into silence, but Batman corrected him with a glare. Damian lowered his arm.

Batman could hear Scarecrow before he could see it; the criminal was yelling “TETCH, HATTER, JERVIS, TETCH, HATTER,” over and over again; the sudden emptiness of the block had the words loudly echoing off the buildings. 

Scarecrow noticed them; it hunched in the saddle and seemed to be preparing for flight, until it straightened up like an intrigued stork to peer at Hatter. 

Its mouth fell open in a silent O— then it screamed like a banshee and kicked its heels into its horse’s flank. The mare made a pained sound of protest and half-way reared before charging straight for them. 

Cool-headed, rational thought kicked in. Scarecrow’s horse would stop before collision on instinct; there was nothing the villain could do to suppress that. Horses weren’t motorcycles. 

But it still  _ would  _ hit one of them, regardless. Scarecrow’s horse was moving very, very fast, and all of that momentum wouldn’t just  _ disappear.  _

“Robin—” The warning rose in Batman’s throat as Damian spurred the Bathorse onward to meet Scarecrow’s charge.

Just before they would’ve hit, Scarecrow leaned left; Damian leaned right. Their horses narrowly missed colliding muzzle to muzzle, veering just enough to not slam into one another. 

Scarecrow leapt out of the saddle with a banshee’s scream and tackled Damian, carrying the boy with him to the concrete. The wet snap of bone was audible, along with an indeterminate crunch; there were two vocalizations, twin screeches of pain and rage, when they landed. 

**_“MINE!!!”_ ** Scarecrow screamed in Damian’s face, grabbing him by the front of his tunic; he shook Robin with shocking ferocity.  **_“MINE, MINE,_ ** **MINE!!!”**

Robin slammed the meat of his palm against Scarecrow’s nose, which gave a comically soft popping sound. The criminal shrieked in pain, slashing a hand across Robin’s face in retribution; it tried to stand, to flee to Tetch, but the slightest weight placed on one of its legs sent a white-hot agony through it, and it tumbled to the ground. 

There it lay, breathing labored, while Batman rushed to Damian’s side. 

“Robin—”

“It’s nothing,” Damian said through his teeth. 

Batman had no doubt that it was not the worst pain Damian had ever experienced- Rā’s Al Ghul must have seen to that- but just by looking at the boy’s face he could tell something was badly damaged.

“I’ll get Nightwing to get you and the Bathorse,” Batman said, uncertain how, precisely, to comfort Damian. “Help will be on its way.”

“Very well, Father,” Damian responded, tightly. After another half a second, he reached into one of the pouches on his belt; Batman didn’t even need to look to know it was the emergency stimulant. 

Batman did not want to move away from Damian, not until he was safe; he remained rooted to the spot, uselessly hovering over the new Robin.

Jason Todd’s features were all too easy to imagine; bright blue eyes, a slightly older, less puppyish face, choppier black hair. 

“Jaso— Ti—  _ Red Robin,”  _ Batman managed, finally. “I need—”

_ “I heard,”  _ Red Robin said.  _ “Dick’s getting in the Batjet right now. Alfred’s prepping to receive Damian—”  _ There was some light scuffling.  _ “Um, Alfred wants to know how bad it looks.”  _

Damian glanced up at Batman, teeth grit, and jerked his head in the direction of Hatter and Scarecrow. 

“Tailbone,” Damian hissed into his comm. “Pelvis.  _ Hurts.”  _

Batman stood. 

Scarecrow had managed to pathetically crawl up to the Mad Hatter on its elbows, reaching out its arm to try to pull him off the horse. It was making odd, retching-gasping sounds amidst half-formed garbles of “Sticks and Stones”, and the Hatter was perfectly silent and unresponsive. 

Batman grabbed Crane by the scruff of its coat, and it was completely limp and unresisting. 

It proved that the Scarecrow’s gasping was actually crying. 

Scarecrow’s whole body trembled with the force of its sobs, and its tears wetted the mask nearly as thickly as the blood from its broken nose. 

“Tetch,” it wept, “Tetch.”

“Don’t worry too much, Crane. You two can have a nice, cozy cell in Arkham together,” Batman curled one arm underneath Scarecrow’s stomach and hoisted it over the back of the horse, right beside the Mad Hatter, who was staring blankly at nothing. 

Scarecrow whimpered, mournfully, and tried to nuzzle Tetch into a response. It was not hard to not feel bad; the memory of Tim dragging himself into the Batcave, completely blinded by his blood in his eyes, was stronger than the pity Scarecrow’s miserable state evoked.

“Commissioner Gordon?” Batman tapped his comm one last time. “I have the Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter.” 

 


	11. Therapy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three months after Jervis Tetch and Jonathan Crane were taken back to Arkham, the guards talk and Crane goes to therapy.

“Crane threw a fit again,” Gibberton rubbed his temples in abject annoyance as he strode into the common room. A cluster of security guards- dressed in Arkham’s grey and blue uniforms- were strewn around the room and on various bits of furniture, morosely drinking cups of steaming coffee. 

_“Again?”_ Fitzgerald looked dismayed. “He’s gotten worse _every_ _time_ he’s showed up here. He _hisses_ at me every time I go past his cell.” 

“Yeah? At least you don’t have  _ night shift,”  _ Romero said, gloomily. “Do you know what he does at night?” 

“God, do I even  _ want _ to know?” Gibberton asked.

“No,” Romero said, “But I’m gonna tell you anyway. He’s  _ always  _ awake. Every damn time. And he’ll crawl up to the wall and  _ scratch  _ on it when you go by. He  _ talks  _ sometimes, too.” 

“Talks?” An interested head popped up; Sergeant Torres peered at Romero in intrigue. 

“Yeah.” Romero shifted uncomfortably. 

“What does he say?” Torres asked. 

“Just mumbles about  _ Tetch,”  _ Romero said. He cleared his throat, and imitated Scarecrow’s weak rasp: “Jervis Tetch, Jervis Tetch, Jervis  _ Tetch.”  _

“Sounds like he has it bad,” Torres mused. 

“No kidding.” Romero rolled his eyes. “I don’t want to be on shift when they get yard time together again. God knows trying to bring them back in will be like trying to get a lion into a cell.” 

“I’m pretty sure they cleared Scarecr- er,  _ Crane-  _ for yard time soon,” Another guard- Vance- volunteered. “He just got his casts off.” 

“Yeah?” Torres swiveled around to look at her. “I hope they schedule me whenever that is.”

“What?  _ Why?”  _ Romero sounded baffled. 

“This is basically a soap opera,” Torres reasoned. “I’ve been employed ever since Tetch came  _ in,  _ like, a decade ago, and I want to see the climax. I can just picture it: they run at one another dramatically, framed by the sunset—” 

“You know these are  _ criminals,  _ right?” Gibberton checked. 

“Yeah—” Torres began. 

Just then, Lieutenant Briggs- a human tank and longtime veteran of the Arkham Guard staff- breezed in. A few of the guards gave lazy salutes. 

“I’m sure that there should be more of you doing your job,” Briggs headed straight for the coffee machine without looking at anyone. 

“It’s fine,” Gibberton told him. “They just put Crane under in order to make him stop screaming, so everything’s quiet now.”

“Jesus, how many forced sedations are we up to?” Fitzgerald groaned. “That’s nearly the tenth this month. Why don’t they just stick him in SHU and forget about him?” 

An immediate chant swept through the guards, as if they had been suddenly possessed: “Because _ patients  _ are **people** too.” 

“I am getting  _ so sick  _ of hearing that,” Fitzgerald grumbled. 

“No more complaining, officer,” Briggs said, pouring himself a cup of joe. He sniffed it as though it could be poisoned, then drank. 

“Who patrols the wing Tetch is in right now?” Torres asked, in the ensuing silence. “I’ve only got one half of the romance novel.” 

“He’s depressed,” Vance provided, freely enough. “He doesn’t  _ hiss  _ at me or anything, but God, he just lays on his cot and stares at the ceiling whenever I walk by.” 

“They  _ miss  _ each other!” Torres exclaimed, partially covering her mouth. “That’s so  _ cute!”  _

“Torres, shut the hell up!” Fitzgerald suddenly snapped. “I will  _ not  _ listen to this bullshit. Lieutenant, tell her to put a sock in it!” 

Briggs’s cup was halfway to his mouth. “Weren’t you speculating on Catwoman and Batman last week, officer?” 

“It’s different,” Fitzgerald objected. “They’re not patients.” 

“Speaking of patience,” Briggs said, “I just lost mine. Your break’s over, Fitz, go back to your rounds.” 

Fitzgerald rose and left without another word of complaint, leaving no lasting void. 

= 

“Hello, Jonathan,” Doctor Forsythe said, kindly. “How are you today?” 

Crane was mute, which was not unusual. 

“Would you like something to write with this session?” The doctor prompted. That managed to garner Crane’s interest- it nodded, jerkily, and looked down at her desk. Forsythe pushed a pad of paper and a flat-tipped marker towards it; Crane was much better at articulating itself when it was allowed a visual aid. 

Crane took the marker. 

“I heard that you’ve been agitated lately, Jonathan,” Forsythe said, sympathetically. “I’ve gotten reports of a few violent outbursts. Why would you say that is?” 

Crane glanced down at its leg, only recently freed from the confines of the cast. The tip of the marker skritched idly, back-and-forth, over the creamy white paper. 

“I know it’s for a few reasons,” Forsythe pressed on, gently. “We’ve already gone over your withdrawal symptoms and the subsequent insomnia. Would you like to tell me how you’ve been managing?” 

“Polly put the kettle on,” Crane lifted up the marker. “Polly put the kettle on and we’ll all have tea.” 

“Yes, the tea,” Forsythe said. “Tetch was drugging you. Do you remember that conversation we had about it?” 

Crane nodded. 

“That’s the reason you feel so awful; it’s the reason you can’t sleep. Do you understand that?” 

Crane scribbled violently on the paper; it was no discernable shape, just a black tangle of lines. 

“Tetch is not a good influence on you, Jonathan,” Forsythe told Crane, firmly. “He’s hurting, and he’s hurting you with him.” 

Crane was very transparent with its body language; Forsythe could see that whatever graciousness and cooperation that it had come to the session with was rapidly vanishing. 

It was  _ important  _ to get it through to Crane that  _ letting Tetch drug it,  _ hit it, and be a piece of his hallucinations was  _ not healthy,  _ but whenever the subject was broached, it closed itself off and that was typically where sessions had to end. 

Forsythe had to compromise. “Never mind that. Let’s talk about your injuries. How are you recovering?” 

Crane sighed, slumping in its chair. “Needles and pins, needles and pins.” 

“You’re in pain?”

A slight nod. 

“How would you rate it, on a scale of one to ten?” 

Crane seemed to think about that. Its fingers fluttered against the desk top, then finally ended up with seven displayed. That… Seemed an  _ alarmingly high  _ number _ ,  _ but it would certainly explain why Crane was so reticent to move or be touched. 

“Do you think they stopped your painkillers too early?” Forsythe asked. 

Crane shook its head. 

“Can you elaborate on that?”

“Needles and pins, needles and pins,” Crane moaned. 

“Is that how your leg feels? Like there are needles and pins?”

Crane looked at her, and there was a slight touch of haughtiness,  _ arrogance  _ in its stare. A fixed “I-know-something-you-don’t-know”. 

“You’re not talking about your leg,” Forsythe interpreted. 

Crane nodded. 

“How much does your  _ leg _ hurt, Jonathan?” 

Crane displayed two fingers. 

“What else hurts?” 

Crane slumped further in its seat. “Tetch.” 

_ “Tetch  _ hurts?” 

Crane made an annoyed sound. 

“I’m sorry for all the questioning,” Forsythe said, patiently. “I’m trying to make everything  _ very clear,  _ so there are no misunderstandings from either of us.” 

“One for sorrow,” Crane sighed. “Four for a boy. Nine for a kiss.” 

Forsythe ended up on the conclusion that she was trying very hard to avoid getting at: “You miss Tetch.”

Crane threw itself abruptly to its feet, gripping the edge of the desk. The guards moved, reflexively, to restrain it; but Forsythe waved them away. 

“Yes!  _ Yes!”  _ Crane cried. 

There was no fury or malice in its expression; its eyes were wide and bright,  _ excited,  _ even. 

“Please,” Crane begged, looming over the desk and into her personal space. “Please.” 

“Jonathan, please remain seated during the sessions,” Forsythe reminded it. 

Crane obediently sat back down, but was nevertheless straight-backed and urgent. It reached for the marker again, and began feverishly drawing; what it returned to Forsythe was a crude rendition of Jervis Tetch, and a hand reaching out to hold his. 

“Jonathan, you know that the doctors and I have been…  _ hesitant  _ to allow you to see Jervis again,” Forsythe began, formulating a plan to gently deny its request. “He is  _ not  _ good for you.” 

Crane shook its head. Pitifully, it whined,  _ “Please.”  _

Forsythe inhaled. “Your dependence on him is unhealthy. He’s been  _ grooming  _ you to rely on him, Jonathan, so you think you  _ need  _ him. You  _ don’t.”  _

“See Saw Margery Daw,” Crane spat in reply, flipping from weakness to rage on a dime. “Johnny shall have a new master.” 

“I don’t understand you,” Forsythe told it, gently. 

Anger burned bright in Crane’s eyes. “I do not like the, Doctor Fell, the reason why, I cannot tell; but this I know, and know full well, I do not like thee, Doctor Fell.” 

Forsythe stared at Crane, who stared right back. They remained in stalemate for some time, until Forsythe conceded.

“I was against it _ ,” _ Forsythe began, hesitantly, “but there was also discussion amongst the staff of allowing the two of you to meet again in a controlled setting—” 

Crane made an urgent sound, and half-way rose, before it remembered itself and settled back down. It folded its thin fingers over its lap, leaning forward in keen interest. 

“—because some of the staff think that interaction in a—” She put extreme emphasis on this, “ ** _Controlled environment_** — would be good for you _and_ Tetch. I spoke with Doctor Lyons personally, and he seems to think that, just like your… _mask…_ it’ll encourage positive growth in the long run.”

Crane made a sound in the back of its throat akin to the creaking hinges on a rusty gate; then it croaked, “Please, Doctor.”

“I’ll have to speak with Lyons,” Forsythe was not broken by its pleads. “It will still be some time, Jonathan, but I expect there will be-” she amended herself, “- _ May  _ be an update by your next session.”

She attempted to keep Crane talking, but it was evident after not too long that it just wasn’t actively trying to concentrate, and when it wasn’t concentrating, everything she said went in one ear and out the other.

It started drawing a horse in the corner of the page during her serious attempts at engaging it in conversation, and after maybe ten minutes or so, she drew the session to a close. 

“Good-bye,” Crane murmured, its guards moving in to flank it on its way out. They knew not to touch Crane unless it was being disobedient, lest they lose a finger in the struggle that  _ would,  _ beyond a shadow of a doubt, ensue. 

One of the guards closed the door behind him, and Forsythe checked her schedule; she had twenty minutes cleared before she had to make a trip to Ivy’s cell…

That seemed to be enough time to talk to Lyons about scheduling something; with any luck on Forsythe’s part, this meeting would go so disastrously that Tetch and Crane would never be allowed to see one another again. 

The thought made her feel like some sort of wicked stepmother; but she shoved that aside. 

This was for the best.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First: apologies for the shorter length, but it had to be this way for the sake of narrative flow.
> 
> Second: There was a lot of cut guard dialogue in this one that I’m hoping to use later, because it discusses something I’ve wanted to tackle for a while: Crane’s gender.
> 
> { O well. Maybe in a few chapters. }
> 
> Third: The next exciting episode has our favorite rat man return to the spotlight.


	12. Hostage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Otis gets desperate.

Otis Flannegan, duffel bag over one arm, headed into the elevator. 

He was nervous. Very nervous. What he was about to do was highly, definitely illegal, but he had done highly, definitely illegal things before.

Never of this severity, though. 

He had spent the past week or so preparing for what he was about to do; he had sent all of the rats away with a teary, heartfelt good-bye, canceled any subscription services, then packed up his apartment. All of his small furniture and any sentimental belongings were distributed to safe stashes around the city, which would be under careful eye of the rats. 

Inside his duffel was all of his Ratcatcher equipment, except that which he could not fit in it; his oxygen tank was too bulky, and he’d had to leave it behind. His staff he had already smuggled in (disguised as a mop) and left in a storage closet upstairs. 

It hadn’t been hard. A custodian’s uniform meant you were almost completely invisible; the gaze of the higher up slid right off a janitor like they weren’t even there. 

Case in point: he stepped on the elevator, looking as conspicuous as a human could be, and the two well-dressed women already on the lift eyed him and his uniform for a half-second, then carried on with their conversation. 

“Bradley’s getting into Yale.” 

“Well, I prefer local. Carton’s going to GCU.”

“Oh, well…” The sheer judgement from those two words radiated through the elevator in a caustic cloud of disdain. 

Otis was more preoccupied with his own internal thoughts, though. Steeling himself for his mission. Trying to put aside the sane glimpses of rationale that urgently leapt in his mind like rats jumping on his pants when he was cutting up grapes for them. 

He’d already broken out in a cold, nervous sweat. The floor he was heading to didn’t have guards, but there was still a sizeable security staff, and it was integral to his mission that he not be stopped  _ before  _ he got where he was trying to go. 

The elevator stopped. Both of the ladies got off, leaving Otis to his own devices. 

He unzipped his duffel bag. 

He had to get dressed quick. He threw on his coat over his uniform, hurriedly buckled his chaps, then fumbled with his belts and their pouches.

He hesitated when he got to the mask- staring at it for half a second- then buckled it on over his head. Without his oxygen tank, he’d had to modify it with a respirator, which was  _ different,  _ but not terrible. 

The seal was tight, and he took the first few rough breaths with it on; adjustment was quick. 

Last of all were his gloves, which he tugged on. He picked up the duffle, which he collected from the floor. 

The elevator came to a gentle stop and the doors opened. 

His palms were sweating, and stuck unpleasantly to the cool leather; Otis gripped the strap of the duffel tightly, wishing it could be substituted for his staff already. 

The hallway was almost completely bare, save for a handful of brass-plated doors; one was the janitorial closet Otis had stashed his disguised staff in, and the others were conference rooms or bathrooms.

Otis knew, from the job he was  _ supposed  _ to be doing right now (cleaning the bathrooms on this floor) that there were no meetings on this level at the moment, so no one would contest him on his way to his gear. 

And they did not. 

Otis collected his staff and left the duffel behind in the closet; appearances were important, and he just wouldn’t look  _ quite  _ as intimidating with a gym bag over one arm. He didn’t mourn its loss much. 

He stepped into the elevator again and went up to the final floor. 

The hallway on the top level was slightly more extravagant than the last; polished marble made up the dominant building material, and modern art installations that were bronze and twisty ringed the walls (they weren’t to Otis’s taste, but to each his own.)

There was a single door on this floor: an ornately carved mahogany door with a nameplate that read B. WAYNE, CEO.

Otis thought about knocking- it was polite, after all- then discarded the idea. There was a half-second of hesitation, but he steeled himself. 

He pushed his way inside. 

Bruce Wayne was at his desk, talking to someone via video call; Otis felt the strangest sense that he should come back once Mr. Wayne was finished, and actually stuttered a step before pressing forward. 

Bruce Wayne’s office had a lot of empty space; the only major pieces of furniture in the room- that was, by all rights, bigger than most houses- were the man’s massive desk and two floor-to-ceiling bookcases indented in the walls, piled high with whatever volumes wealthy people thought looked good on shelves. There were a few potted ferns, but they looked comically small in the giant, empty room.

“I’ll get back to you, Damian,” Mr. Wayne said, after his gaze briefly lingered on Otis. “I have a guest.” 

The video call ended, and Mr. Wayne stood up. His expression was cautious. “Did we have an appointment, Mr.—?”

“Flannegan. Otis Flannegan. But you can call me the Ratcatcher.” Otis told him. He strode, slowly, up to Mr. Wayne’s desk. “I've been working here for three months.”

“You’re not from the union, are you?” Mr. Wayne joked. 

“No, Mr. Wayne,” Otis said, placing a gloved hand down on his big, mahogany desk. “Call security.”  

“Is something wrong?” Mr. Wayne asked, adopting a far more concerned tone.

“Yes,” Otis said. “I’m taking you hostage.”  

He slammed his staff down on the floor, and the rats poured out from the walls; from the cracks in the bookshelves, from the holes laboriously chipped in the walls with hundreds of rodent teeth, burrowing from the outside in. 

They came in a flood, carpeting the floor with slender, furry bodies. 

Mr. Wayne had the faintest touch of shock on his face; Otis wondered if his boss was properly processing everything. 

“Do you know how many rats were living in this building before I got here?” Otis asked, leaning forward.  _ “Hundreds,  _ Mr. Wayne. Granted, most of them were on the lower floors, but it wasn’t too hard to convince them to climb to the upper levels…” 

“I think we can work this out,” Mr. Wayne said, carefully. “Do you want money?”

“No,” Otis told him, sharply. “I don’t want money.”

“Is this about  _ revenge?”  _ Mr. Wayne asked. 

“No— At least, not with you or your staff.” 

“Then what  _ do  _ you want?” Mr. Wayne said, tight and clipped. “I am a  _ very  _ influential man. I’m sure I could—”  

Otis drew away from the desk. The tide of rats parted in his wake. 

“You  _ still  _ haven’t called security,” Otis cut him off to observe. “Why?” 

“I think we can handle this ourselves,” Mr. Wayne said.

“That’s not what  _ I  _ want, Mr. Wayne,” Otis turned back around to glare. “I want  _ Batman.”  _

Mr. Wayne started. “Batman?” 

“Yes,  _ Batman!”  _ Otis didn’t want to lose his temper; he bit down on the knuckle of his glove and exhaled, sharply, through his nose. It wasn’t Mr. Wayne’s fault.  _ None  _ of this was Mr. Wayne’s fault. “I  _ know  _ you’re working for him.” 

Mr. Wayne froze, and that seemed to take down the temperature of the office with him. “ _ Working  _ for him? I give the city a grant for public building repair after his scuffles, but I  _ hate  _ seeing Gotham in pieces due to a vigilante. I don’t  _ work  _ for a  _ criminal.”  _

Otis turned back to Mr. Wayne, smoothing his own agitated expression. 

“I know about the lab,” Otis said, soft and smooth. “Downstairs. Rats get  _ everywhere,  _ you know.” 

A rat scrambled up Otis’ pant leg, a batarang awkwardly held in its mouth; Otis took it, then held it out to Mr. Wayne, where it glittered in the light from the sprawling bow window behind him.

“Gnarled-toe took this from the sublevel workshop,” Otis said, putting it down on the desk. “I am  _ not  _ an idiot, Mr. Wayne. I know you supply him.” 

“This is a misunderstanding,” Mr. Wayne said, careful and diplomatic. 

“I  _ don’t  _ want to lose my temper, Mr. Wayne. You’ve been very nice to your employees, from what I’ve seen, and I really don’t want to see you hurt. But  _ I  _ want to see  **Batman,** and if you don’t call him here, I’ll feed these poor, starving rats your  _ flesh.”  _  He punctuated his statement with an emphatic slam of his staff against the floor, and cooed: “These poor babies only get  _ scraps  _ that your  _ employees  _ leave out; the protein should be good for them.” 

Mr. Wayne appeared to be rapidly thinking. 

“Alright,” He agreed, carefully. “I’ll call him.” 

He did something underneath his desk; pressed a panic button, maybe? Otis wasn’t concerned. Even if it wasn’t to call Batman, the Dark Knight was sure to arrive anyway. In these three months since Scarecrow and Mad Hatter’s capture, things had calmed considerably; taking Bruce Wayne hostage was sure to get the Batman’s attention, one way or the other.

“How long should it take?” Otis asked. 

“Less than ten minutes,” Mr. Wayne said, tersely. 

The tension in the air slackened after his answer, and Otis abruptly sat down on the edge of Mr. Wayne’s desk. He checked his phone. It was early afternoon, still, just before the rush for lunch would begin. He put his phone away. 

“This isn’t personal,” Otis said, after a short stint of silence. “I just wanted to tell you that. I have no qualms against you. You’re a good boss, and you deal with the little babies  _ very  _ humanely. No kill traps. My other janitor jobs all had kill traps.” 

Mr. Wayne didn’t say anything. Otis carried on.

“I just needed you because you were high-profile, convenient, and had connections— If I were a janitor for the Daily Planet and I wanted to talk to Superman, I’d take Lois Lane hostage. It’s really not personal.” 

“I believe you,” Mr. Wayne said. 

Otis nodded. After another pause, he said, “Do you mind if I keep talking?”

“Do I have a choice? I  _ am  _ a hostage. I can’t stop you.” 

“Well,” Otis shifted. “I’d like to pretend you have a choice.” 

“Go ahead.” Mr. Wayne said, smoothly.

“Batman is  _ ignoring  _ me,” Otis said, trying to stay calm. “That’s why I had to do this. I figured, if Batman won’t take the letters my rats send, I’ll make  _ him  _ come to  _ me.  _ He can’t ignore Bruce Wayne’s kidnapping— who  _ could?” _

“I get it. But I really wish you’d picked someone else. I have a meeting in ten minutes.” Mr. Wayne intoned. 

“Once Batman gets here, I don’t need you,” Otis told him, dismissively. “Unless he won’t talk to me without a hostage. Then I’ll need you.” 

“He’ll talk to you,” Mr. Wayne said.

“Do you think so? I don’t think he likes criminals very much. Unless it’s  _ Catwoman.”  _ Otis recognized that he was bitterly complaining to a captive- and a famous, incredibly wealthy, blue-blooded captive who was a complete stranger- but the only other person he’d been able to talk to lately was the rats, and he wanted a more…  _ human  _ perspective. “He can  _ always  _ make time for  _ Catwoman.”  _

Mr. Wayne did not give any indication of hearing. 

Otis pushed himself off of Mr. Wayne’s desk, beginning to pace. His staff  _ tak’ _ ed against the floor with every step; his dear children smoothly parted the way for him as he moved. The wait was agitating him, and the jittery impatience he’d had since arriving to work today was only increasing. 

He was about to turn back around and demand Mr. Wayne put him in direct contact with Batman, when the man spoke up: 

“How much do you know, Otis?” 

It was soft and understated this time; not the voice of a brusque businessman, or a wealthy playboy. There was a cool, calculating stare fixing Otis from the other side of the desk, and for the briefest of moments, Otis felt a stab of uncertainty. 

“Excuse me, Mr. Wayne?” 

His nervous sweat, which had just begun to cool, broke out again. 

“How much do you know about me and Batman?” 

“I think that’s for me to know,” Otis said. He’d stopped, mid-stride, on the upswing that’d take him to Mr. Wayne’s desk. 

The soon-to-be former janitor sensed that Mr. Wayne’s question was important; though for the moment a gaping black question mark flashed in his mind when he wondered why Mr. Wayne would  _ care  _ how much Otis knew. 

“I need to see how deep the breach went,” Mr. Wayne was charismatic, but Otis detected an underlying caution to his words. “In order to tighten security.” 

“Well,” Otis thunked his staff, authoritatively, against the floor. He didn’t  _ want  _ to tell Mr. Wayne, but he also saw no legitimate reason  _ not  _ to. It could even  _ help  _ him seem a little more genuine. “It wasn’t what I  _ meant  _ to do. I wasn’t looking for it purposely.” 

“Start from the beginning,” Mr. Wayne had a very sympathetic, coaxing voice when he liked. 

“There’s not too much to tell,” Otis drew up his shoulders, guardedly. “I let the rats explore, because I wanted to get a sense of where trash and dust and the like was accumulating; I  _ also  _ wanted to make notice of where pipes, cables, or cords were beginning to erode. In doing so, my babies and I noticed that every southeastern room, starting from  _ your  _ floor all the way down, had walls that were three or so feet too short. Your head custodian gave me some of the old building floor plans after I asked, and I matched them with the current plans; I found that there was a discrepancy in wall depth starting with a renovation about fifteen years ago. After I realized  _ that,  _ I had the rats chew a hole through the wall, and when they were finished, we found a circular tube of solid steel that was  _ not  _ in the plans.”

Was it his imagination, or was Mr. Wayne starting to look shaken? 

“There was only one thing I thought it could be: a secret elevator, or chute, or the like,” Otis said. “I tried to direct my rats to chew through the metal, but their poor teeth were too delicate. I worked a night shift about a month ago where I spent the shift gouging a hole big enough for a rat to get through, and let my babies take it from there. I haven’t been down there myself, but they brought lots of interesting things back that put the pieces together.” 

In a slightly subdued voice, Mr. Wayne said: “Lucius mentioned there was a few missing items, but no sign of a break-in. No video footage of anything.” 

“I can give everything back,” Otis offered, with a frown. “I don’t want to get you in trouble with Batman. I just want to talk to him.” 

Mr. Wayne nodded, slightly. 

“I also don’t want to hurt you if I don’t have to,” Otis reiterated. “You’re a good boss.” 

And, as if cued, the Batjet appeared as a small black dot on the horizon,  _ very  _ rapidly approaching. Otis straightened to see, and all of the rats abruptly reared on their hind legs to look, too; Otis realized he had accidentally let his own emotions spill into their tiny minds, and the random bolt of endorphins probably surprised them. 

Mr. Wayne stood up and opened the window behind him; a moment later, a black shape swung its way in and landed on the floor. 

It was not Batman.

The rats began vocalizing; squalling in outrage, tails writhing and haunches lifting. It may have been indignation on Otis’s behalf, or it may have been his mind melding with theirs’, projecting his feelings into them. In any case, the newcomer was unwelcome. 

“Nightwing?” Otis’s voice was sharp with disbelief. “I asked for  _ Batman,  _ not you!” 

“Yeah, well, big bad Bats is busy right now,” Bludhaven’s champion dusted invisible specks off his armor. “He and the little Robin are dealing with Killer Croc right now.” 

Otis was trying very hard to keep his cool. He never had  _ angry  _ outbursts- he was not an explosive type of personality- but this—  _ this  _ was the kind of thing that made the Joker blow up hospitals for fun. 

With a sharp inhale, Otis said, “I’ll wait, then,” and resigned himself to the delay. 

Nightwing gave him a funny look. 

“No, this is the part where  _ I  _ kick your ass and put you in…” he sucked a breath in through his teeth, and looked Otis up and down. “Well, I’m thinking Arkham, but maybe Blackgate. We’ll see.” 

It took a second for Otis to process his statement, and by then, Nightwing had gotten his shock batons from his holsters and held them, threateningly, aloft. 

Otis balked for a second, but didn’t give any ground. He and his babies were more than a match for one man, even if it did happen to be Nightwing. 

“I think we can talk about this,” Mr. Wayne cautioned. “No one has to get hurt.” 

“Sorry, sir,” Nightwing said, a sharp grin breaking out over his face, “I think you’d better let me handle this, and get yourself somewhere safe. It’s out of your hands now.” 

Mr. Wayne opened his mouth to say something, but Otis cut him off before he could, slashing his staff threateningly through the air. 

“So be it!” Otis shouted.

Otis was not usually the reckless, blustery,  _ yelling  _ type; but months of being callously ignored took ahold of him, and he charged at Nightwing, staff swinging. 

The rats poured out in droves, leaping on Nightwing and scrambling up his clothes; the former Robin had severely underestimated the amount of damage rats could deal, and he yelped, trying to fling them off; it was all he could do, amidst the distraction, to throw himself out of the way of a sweeping strike of Otis’s staff. 

They fought a small path through Mr. Wayne’s office; despite the wide space, they managed to tip over two plants, scatter stacks of paper, send a few books flying, and trip up the carpet. Otis remained on the offensive for the most part, overzealously slinging his staff around; Nightwing attempted, meanwhile, to dodge or parry his strikes, all the while keeping rats from getting at his mostly unprotected face. 

Nightwing blocked a swing, putting Otis off balance, and struck him in the chest with his palm; Otis’s breath was knocked from him, and his fingers reflexively opened, sending his staff clattering to the ground.

Nightwing was overtaken by the horde of rats just as Otis fell to the floor; the former Robin gave a muffled yell of panic, trying to tear the rodents off his face—

“That’s  _ enough!  _ Flannegan, call them off!”

Oh, that  _ voice.  _

Otis, who was currently dry-heaving on his hands and knees, one arm folded over his stomach, glanced hopefully up.

Batman stood there; cape billowing slightly in the breeze from the open window. He cut an awe-inspiring figure— dark, ominous,  _ intimidating,  _ and somehow fit for the room. 

Otis swallowed a mouthful of acrid saliva, his roiling stomach threatening to bring up bile and his sternum offering up a considerable deal of pain. The rats scattered from Nightwing, retreating to the shadows; they left behind a young man with a considerable number of small, lightly bleeding wounds. 

“Batman,” Otis tried to get up, swallowing acid. The spot that Nightwing jabbed him really,  _ really  _ hurt. “There you are! I’ve been wanting to see you!” 

Batman’s facial expression was completely blank and unreadable. 

“Three months! Not so much as an acknowledgement of my existence!” Otis told him, trying to not sound hurt. “You said you would  _ stay in touch!”  _

“This wasn’t the right way to get my attention.”

“You ignored my babies when I sent them to you!”  Otis cried. “What else could I  _ do?”  _

Nightwing made a sort of half-choked sound; Otis regarded him with alarm, frightened he would be injured and Batman would blame  _ Otis  _ for it. But, oddly, the vigilante appeared to be  _ smiling.  _

“Nightwing, I can handle it from here,” Batman said, with a glare that could melt steel. “Get back to the Batcave and get yourself looked at.” 

“None of the rats had rabies,” Otis was unsure what else to say. “I don’t like hurting any of my little babies, but… the poor things don’t deserve suffering through that—”  

Nightwing attempted to wipe the blood off his brow, but ended up smearing it more than anything. He ignored Otis entirely. “You’re  _ sure?  _ I don’t even think  _ you  _ could fight a hundred rats at once.” 

“Otis won’t use his rats against me.” Batman said, with such patient assurance that Otis found himself unwittingly agreeing. “Batcave.  _ Now.”  _

Nightwing gave him a look and shrugged. He went back out through the window, leaping out of sight and to what would be anyone else’s untimely death. 

Batman didn’t seem concerned, though, so neither was Otis; he turned back around to say something else to Batman, and was promptly grabbed by the front of his coat and slammed into Bruce Wayne’s desk. 

He yelped, and Batman loomed in very close. 

“Do not do this.  _ Ever  _ again. There are better ways to get attention than taking Bruce Wayne hostage.” 

“It worked,” Otis told him. “You’re here.” 

He stiffened in preparation for a blow that did not come. Batman glared at him a moment, then let go of his coat and turned around, putting a few steps of distance between them. 

Otis cautiously straightened up. His lower back smouldered from where it’d been rammed against the desk, but he ignored it. 

“I won’t tell,” Otis told Batman, meekly, unsure of what else to say. “About you and Bruce Wayne. I wouldn’t do that.” 

“Otis, I  _ can’t _ trust you with that kind of information,” Batman looked over his shoulder at the Ratcatcher. “This entire situation only proves to me that I was  _ right  _ about not contacting you.”

That hurt. 

“I haven’t told anyone,” Otis objected, weakly. “That proves something, doesn’t it?” 

“Only that you don’t have anyone to tell,” Batman said. 

That hurt worse. 

Otis sank down onto Mr. Wayne’s desk, drawing up his knees and curling his arms defensively around himself. A few sympathetic rats crept out from the shadows to come to his side and comfort him. 

“I’m going to go to prison, aren’t I?” Otis asked, sounding hollow. 

“Most likely.” Batman said. “There’s surveillance footage and the word of Mr. Wayne against you. You’d be reamed in court.” 

Otis nodded. He had already accounted for as much- clearing out his apartment and canceling subscription services and all- but the reality of it was beginning to settle in. He had to ask himself, now: had it been  _ worth  _ it?

He looked up at Batman, who was staring down at him with an indeterminate, but very obviously disappointed, expression. Batman was angry, true, but he was  _ there.  _ It had  _ worked.  _

“Is Blackgate bad?” Otis asked. 

“I don’t think they’d take you to Blackgate.”

“Arkham?”

Batman’s stare seemed to bore holes into Otis’s very soul. One of the rats reassuringly nibbled on the fingertip of his glove. 

“I can’t let you go to Arkham,” Batman said. 

“I wouldn’t tell anyone,” Otis assured him. “I  _ wouldn’t.”  _

“It’s not just that, though that is my main concern.” Batman had a cold, contemplative expression. “Rats can go anywhere. You’d be a smuggling risk; an entirely new kind of security would need to be set in place all over the Asylum, and it would be costly and wasteful.” 

Otis pursed his lips. “So if not Blackgate, and if not Arkham, then where?” 

“Nowhere,” Batman said. 

“Nowhere?” Otis repeated. 

“I will discuss with Mr. Wayne, on your behalf, pretending as if this never happened,” Batman narrowed his eyes. “You’ll go back to your job, and you’ll keep everything you’ve seen quiet. But if I even  _ think  _ you’re a flight risk, or think you’re going to share what you’ve learned here with anyone—” 

The threat was allowed to hang for a moment. Otis rocked, back and forth, uneasily.

Batman lowered his voice, and approached Otis like he was a wounded animal. “I don’t like having to do this, but the Batcave has permanent residence areas for people like you.” 

That sank in. 

“... Like a Batjail?” Otis asked, uneasily. 

“Yes,” Batman said.

“... Is anyone  _ in  _ it?” 

“Yes,” Batman said. 

Otis shivered. He got the feeling that there would not be any rats in Batjail. He got the feeling there would not be much of  _ anything  _ in Batjail. 

“I didn’t go looking for trouble,” Otis tried, again, to defend himself. “I didn’t try to find the connection between you and Mr. Wayne on purpose. I just— All of this was because I wanted to  _ talk  _ to you.” 

Batman made a slight, derisive sound. 

“You have me here now; I’d suggest you make it count, because if you try this stunt again, it’ll be the Robins who handle you.” 

Otis had never wanted to say anything less in his entire life. All of this effort- the weeks of planning, the pain, the distributing of his things in rat caches all around the city, the cancelation of his accounts- had been building up to this point. 

“What is it?” Batman prompted. 

Otis’s mouth  _ and  _ brain agreed the best plan of action was to say nothing. 

“Otis?” There was a slight curve of concern to Batman’s face, now, and it made the Ratcatcher’s stomach  _ twist  _ in obscene and horrible ways. “What did you think was so important you had to nearly throw your life away like this?” 

Otis’s mouth shifted; his throat dipped as he swallowed, soundlessly. 

He looked down, toed the ground with the tip of his boot, and said, quietly:

“... I just wanted to spend some time with you.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments appreciated! 
> 
> ( Don't worry, we have the reunion coming up next chapter! <3 )


	13. Screen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Screen Door method is employed.

“Let’s review,” Dr. Reginald Lyons began.

Dr. Vanessa Forsythe had only just stepped into his office; she closed his door, thoughtfully, behind herself.

“No, ‘thank you for coming, Vanessa’?” She asked when she turned around, a tight smile on her face. “I’ve got a busy schedule, you know. I’ve seen Dent, Merkel, and Jones today already. And it isn’t even lunch yet.” 

“I’m sorry,” Lyons said, in a tone that implied he was not all that sorry at all. “I’ve been reviewing Jonathan Crane and Jervis Tetch’s records in preparation for today, and all of the reading has me frazzled. I would very much like to begin as soon as possible, Vanessa.” 

“That’s fine,” Vanessa lightly sat on the chair opposite his desk. 

Dr. Lyons was a senior official at Arkham. He had been working there for quite some time, and- although it was hotly debated among orderlies- may have been the longest-serving doctor in the Asylum.

This afforded him two offices; one he conducted sessions in, and one that was a little more  _ homey. _ Here, in his furnished office, he had comfortable armchairs, painted walls, a decorative rug, bookshelves, a solid oaken desk, and (Forsythe envied this most of all) a cup of pens and sharpened pencils on display instead of flat, blunt markers.

“Let’s start with the first meeting,” Lyons said, not allowing Forsythe time to ogle the nice furniture. “As you know, two weeks ago we started putting them through the Screen Door Policy—” 

=

“Hello, Jervis,” Doctor Lyons said. 

Blearily, Jervis raised his head. He was feeling quite mimsy today; foggy, sluggish, and weak. 

He wished, fleetingly, he had more to complain about than general malaise. It would be a simple treatment if his head ached or if his hallucinations came on too strong, but this terrible feeling of  _ emptiness  _ could only be exaggerated, not reduced, by Arkham’s treatment. 

He missed Crane. He missed the tea-parties, he missed the little quirks of the Scarecrow’s speaking and the way it moved; he missed the haltering voice, he missed the cackles and shrieks of glee, the acrid smell of cooking fear toxin and the warmth of a spidery body. 

And that was not something Arkham could remedy with pills and therapy. 

“We have something special planned today.” 

Had it been any other doctor- and Jervis had had  _ many  _ other doctors at Arkham- that would’ve brought a twist of dread to his heart.  _ Special treatment  _ usually meant ‘ _ we got permission for electroshock therapy’  _ or ‘ _ there’s a new cocktail of drugs developed that will cause you to have heart palpitations and headaches and explosive vomiting, but don’t worry, it should stop you from being happy, too!’  _

But not Doctor Lyons. He had always been candid with Jervis, though not overly gentle or coddling. 

Warily, Jervis rasped:  _ “But four young oysters hurried up, all eager for the treat: Their coats were brushed, their faces washed, their shoes were clean and neat. And this was odd, because, you know, they hadn’t any feet.”  _

“Oh, no, Jervis. This isn’t like that,” Dr Lyons assured. “No carpenters, no walruses. We’re taking you to meet someone.”

Jervis processed that a moment.

“Who?” He asked.

“If you’ll follow me, I’ll show you,” Dr Lyons coaxed.

Jervis, who had been highly reticent to leave his cot other than when forced, found himself rising. He straightened wrinkles out of his jumpsuit- it was best to look presentable when one found oneself in company of someone  _ special-  _ and willingly walked to the door of his cell. 

Dr Lyons and a few guards led Jervis past the cells of his fellow patients; the wing Jervis was committed to was for those who had commited minimal to no assaults while in Arkham, and was generally comprised of quiet, listless fellows who kept their heads down and mouths closed. 

William McElroy, Jervis’s left-hand cellmate, looked up from his book and curiously stared at him as he walked down the hall. Julian Day, who’d been attempting to chip a calendar into the wall with his fingernail, glared distrustfully at Jervis and his entourage. Arnold Wesker, who’d been recaptured not too long ago, was quietly sobbing into his hands and didn’t so much as look up. (He’d been like that ever since they took Scarface away from him, and these days, Jervis felt as though he understood the man much better.)

The Tweedle Cousins waved at Jervis from their separate cells— they’d been placed at nearly opposite ends of the hall, in order to prevent them from conspiring, but were glued at the hip during mealtimes, yard time, and recreation. Jervis wanted to wave back, but some great well of apathy inside him kept him from simply lifting his arm and shaking his hand at them. 

There were countless more; some Jervis knew, and some he didn’t. Charles Brown was folding intimately-made paper airplanes and throwing them around the room. Bookworm waved at Jervis and mouthed “‘Were you happy in prison, dear child?’ said Haigha”, and Jervis couldn’t even muster the response that he  _ wanted  _ to say: “Hatta looked round once more, and this time a tear or two trickled down his cheek: but not a word would he say.” 

(The irony was lost on him.)

“Dr Lyons, wait!” A voice called. 

Dr Lyons stuttered a step, and turned to look.

Before he could get the chance to move towards the prisoner, one of the accompanying guards said, “Sir, if we don’t get there before Forsythe, there could be some problems. We don’t have time for this.” 

“It’ll just be a moment!” The prisoner exclaimed. “Riddle me this, Dr Lyons—” 

But he and Jervis were ushered out of the non-violent offenders wing, leaving the riddle on the man’s lips. 

The door closed behind them with a hydraulic hiss. One of the guards scanned his badge against the wall, and there was the loud, heavy sound of a bolt shutting. Security had been significantly increased over the years; escapes had to get more and more violent and destructive to match, and were frequently from the outside in rather than the inside out. 

“Wherever are we going?” Jervis asked, as they journeyed down a hallway. One of the guards received a radio message about a prisoner in transit, and they had to stop for a moment to allow the aforementioned prisoner to pass. They stopped soon enough that they didn’t even receive a glimpse of whoever it was before they received the all-clear. _“‘Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?’”_

“We have special rooms for what we call  _ Screen Door  _ therapy,” Dr Lyons said. “They’re designed for special cases of severe social difficulty. Mr. Ryder and Dr. Quinzel have made some progress through the treatment, and Doctor Forsythe and I thought that it could be employed in your case.” 

That name faintly prickled Jervis’s hindbrain. He  _ knew  _ Doctor Forsythe. Once upon a time he had been in her care- though it would be harder to name a therapist he hadn’t seen at Arkham than one he had- but he didn’t think that was why it was clicking for him. 

Doctor  _ Scythe.  _

That’s what Scarecrow always called her, because it was easier for it to remember and say. Dr Forsythe was dear  _ Crane’s  _ primary therapist. 

Everything became very muddled, as all of the facts of the situation all began jumping up and veritably shouting “pick me, pick me!” Calming the excitable crowd of cats, pigs, rabbits, mice, gnats, gryphons, mock turtles, unicorns, lions, playing cards, chess pieces, caterpillars, eggs, and humans of all kinds rampaging through his brain was like putting out a house fire with only a tablespoon to scoop up water with. 

“Jervis?” Dr Lyons prompted. 

They has stopped walking. Jervis hadn’t even realized he’d clamped down on his own forefinger with his teeth; not deep enough to draw blood, but to leave a few crescent-shaped bruises. He took his slobbery knuckle out of his mouth. 

“Yes, I’m sorry, what?” The din was still playing in the back of his mind, quieted, but still rambunctious and distracting. He’d suddenly forgot what they were all excitable over, but he was swept up in the energy of the crowd, nevertheless. It’d been so long since he’d heard all of their voices, or felt the pulse of Wonderland run through his neurons! Maybe letting them shout wouldn’t be so bad after all. 

“I asked if you were alright. We can return to your cell if you feel you’re not prepared for this.” 

“No, no! I am! I  _ am  _ prepared!” Jervis blurted. He didn’t know what for, but he  _ was  _ prepared. Prepared for anything.

“Alright, then,” Dr Lyons gave him a quick once-over, then nodded. 

There was a lift they all stepped into; after either a short jaunt up or a short jaunt down (Jervis hazarded down, but a guard was blocking his view of the elevator buttons) they arrived in another dull metal hallway. 

One of the guard’s radios chattered. It was hard to understand, but Jervis thought he heard: 

_ “Violent patient inbound from floor five to floor two, elevator 3. Please clear the western hallways for transit to S-D-O-1, over.”  _

“Copy that,” One of Jervis’s guards said into his radio. He turned back to Dr Lyons. “Doctor, we gotta hurry it up or we’re gonna have an incident.” 

Jervis was starting to feel nervous from all the talk of codes and incidents and  _ violent patient  _ mentionings, but he went along where Dr Lyons directed him.

Another hydraulic door opened, and they came to a strange little room. It was whitewashed and empty, and, curiously, split down the middle by a wall made of plexiglass. On the other half of the plexiglass was  _ another  _ hydraulic door, identical to the one they’d just stepped in through. 

“Curiouser and curiouser,” Jervis murmured to himself. He glanced back at Lyons, warily. “Pray, what is this?” 

Lyons was no longer there. Jervis realized, with a start, he had likely not even gone through the door. 

This was not like any therapy he had ever,  _ ever  _ been in. 

The hydraulic door on the other side of the glass groaned and slid open, and there it was: 

Crane, the  _ Scarecrow, _ gangly and awkward, with its too-thin, too-long limbs and miserably crooked posture; the home-made mask from scraps of bedsheet and forcibly manicured Arkham nails. 

As soon as it saw him, Crane tore forward, wrenching itself free of its shocked guards and screeching “JERVIS!” at the top of its lungs. It managed to stop just short of banging itself into the plexiglass barrier, and clawed frantically as if to gouge through it.

“Jervis!” It cried, weakly. “Jervis!” 

It was  _ Crane!  _ In the blood, in the flesh!

It was taking a moment to process, but it was rapidly beginning to sink in, and Jervis was grinning, grinning like a fool! 

_ It had  _ **_been so long_ ** _ since he had seen dear Crane! _

“Dearest!” Jervis patted at the glass rather tamely in comparison to the onslaught Crane was subjecting it to. “It’s so nice to see you! It’s been  _ horrible  _ without you! _ ‘‘I wish I had our Dinah here, I know I do!’ said Alice aloud, addressing nobody in particular.’”  _

The guards had finally caught up with Crane, and were trying to pull it back, away from the glass. They’d both had the insight to put their face shields up, or else Crane would have tried to bite off the one on the left’s nose. 

“We told you when we brought you in, Crane,” One of them grunted, “That you  _ can’t see him  _ if you can’t freaking behave—!” 

They’d managed to haul it back a ways. Crane let out an ear-piercing wail of rage and frustration.

“Dearest! Did you hear them?” Tetch called. He had his nose jammed against the glass- while he may not have expressed his enthusiasm quite as openly as the Scarecrow, he didn’t want Crane to leave yet! The mere idea was very—  _ very  _ distressing! You simply  _ couldn’t  _ remove a guest from the tea-party against their wishes! “Crane!  _ Crane!”  _

“You’ve got one chance before I  _ taze  _ you, you freak!” The other guard yelled. “Calm the fuck down or—” 

Crane screeched, thrashing in their grip. It managed to break away and sprint to Jervis, only to seize and pitch forward, muscles spasming uncontrollably as it fell. One of the guards cursed, rushing over to help Crane, while the other stuffed his taser gun away.

“I warned him, Vance,” the taser-wielding guard said, breathlessly. “We both did. You heard me.” 

“Shut the fuck up, Fitz,” the other replied, hotly. “Let’s get him out of here before he gets a second wind.” 

“No!” Tetch said, alarmed. His hands pattered against the glass in a desperate tattoo. “No! You can’t take it away, it only just got here! Please, I haven’t seen the poor dear in—” 

“Shut it, or you’re next!” To punctuate the remark, Fitz banged his fist against the glass. Jervis flinched. 

“Help me, you asshat,” Vance had pulled out the taser barbs, and was cinching handcuffs around Crane’s wrists. The Scarecrow’s tired, pained red eyes locked with Jervis’s, and the poor Hatter’s heart began roaring in his ears. He banged harder, more insistently, against the glass.

“You can’t treat Crane like that! You can’t!” Jervis raged. “Release it at once and  _ leave!”  _

His shouts fell on deaf ears. 

Crane was promptly escorted from the room, and after a moment, Jervis’s own entourage of guards arrived to lead him out. Jervis anticipated speaking to Dr Lyons, to explain to him that this was all a  _ misunderstanding,  _ and demand that those who brutalized the poor Scarecrow ought to be fired— 

But Dr Lyons wasn’t there, and his pleas to the guards to let him check on Crane or see him went ignored. Demands for an audience with Dr Lyons were also met with stony-faced silence. Jervis may have gotten violent- seized a guard and tearfully demanded he be allowed to see Crane again- but that lead to his handcuffing and being battered around a considerable deal. 

After a futile half-minute of resistance, Jervis was marched back to his cell, and presumably, so was Crane. 

Wesker’s agonized sobbing from across the hallway was accompanied that night. 

=

“The first meeting was a disaster,” Vanessa Forsythe chose to summarize.

“Well,” Lyons stated. “The  _ first  _ meeting, maybe. But all the first meetings were like that. Ryder and Bennett both behaved exactly like Crane— this was not  _ unexpected.  _ And  _ you  _ still agreed to a second go-around, remember that.” 

“Only because I wanted to convince you that they need to be as far away from one another as possible.” Forsythe corrected. 

“Why don’t we move on?” Lyon’s glare suggested he had no proper comeback to her reply. She allowed herself some slight smugness at that. “The  _ second  _ try was much more successful, don’t you think?” 

Forsythe frowned.

=

Crane missed Tetch so much it hurt. 

It was heartbreak unlike anything it had ever experienced. Its entire existence was  _ mired  _ in missing Jervis Tetch and its freedom, which sometimes it could not differentiate between. 

It missed its hoard up in their warehouse. It missed the tea and buttered toast. It missed Jervis’s crooked teeth and lumpy nose and strawlike hair. It missed the smell of the paint Jervis used for his cards, and working by candlelight repairing its torn clothes while Jervis painstakingly stitched the lining in a new hat right next to it. 

It had taken  _ three months,  _ but Crane had finally gotten a glimpse of Jervis Tetch, and as a cruel twist of fate, had been nigh-immediately reprimanded and dragged back to its cell.

During its next session with Forsythe, the doctor had very carefully and patiently explained the reason for that was because Crane had gotten too excited. The  _ next  _ time they met, Crane would need to be quiet, polite, and docile, or it would lose him again. 

Crane had  _ known  _ that, even at the time. But it couldn’t help itself. It didn’t  _ want  _ to help itself. Every rational thought that told it to wait and be still was discarded in the face of seeing Tetch again. 

Even just the few seconds it had gotten to see him were just as sweet- no,  _ more  _ sweet- than toxin. The last time Crane had seen him, Jervis was quiet and silent and would not  _ move,  _ no matter even if Crane nuzzled him or called his name or tried to jar him out of his stupor. 

This time, though, he was full of life. He had banged on the glass and called out to Crane. He had been concerned! He had been happy to see it! There was no mistaking the brilliant blue twinkle in the short hatter’s eyes. 

It was the most bittersweet thing in the world. It was all so  _ unfair. _

Footsteps came down the hallway; in response, Crane defensively bunched up in the corner of its cot.

From down the hall, shouts from other inmates sounded: “Would you like to see where  _ your  _ tally-mark spot is, Vanessa?”, or “Let me guess: need help with your divorce settlement, Forsythe? I’d recommend taking half!”, and other such remarks. 

Crane was in the wing for  _ violent _ inmates. Vulgarity and various other reprehensible behavior was common, and in order to deter harassment, the arrangement of cells were staggered as to not allow inmates to see one another from most angles.

“Are ya here for me, Doc?” The voice was Crane’s adjacent cellmate, a young woman with a bubbly voice. 

“No, Ms. Quinzel. I’m here for Mr. Crane.” 

“Aw, nuts.” 

Dr Forsythe came into view with a pair of guards at her sides.

Crane did not want to do therapy today. It would like to be miserable and lay around the room despondently, like a discarded chip bag. 

“Dr Lyons and I decided that you get to see Tetch today,” Dr Forsythe said. Crane’s head jerked upright, and it stared at her, attention now fully captivated. “But you  _ have  _ to remember, Jonathan, to stay calm. If you’re not calm, we have to take you back to your cell. Can you repeat that back to me?”

“Calm,” Crane said, slowly. 

“Right,” Forsythe agreed. “You have to be calm. Say it again.”

_ “Calm,”  _ Crane repeated. 

“Good.” She stepped back to allow the guards to open its door, and Crane slowly rose, obediently taking its position sandwiched between the guards. 

Crane began shivering from nervous excitement as soon as they left its cell. Tetch became a singleminded focus, completely overriding the nasty sneers of the homicidal maniacs in the violent wing. Crane wanted to  _ see  _ him!

“Jonathan,” Forsythe asked, kindly, “Do you remember what you have to do when you see Tetch?”

That barely managed to jar it from its daydreaming. It swung its head towards her, taking a moment to process, and nodded. 

“Calm,” it recited. 

“Good,” she said. “Your  _ best  _ behavior, Jonathan.”

A painful flicker of memory came through it; a flood of discomfort from an uncomfortable, scratchy overcoat, tight little shoes that blistered, a tie pulled tight enough to choke; and, oh, the paddling that came  _ after.  _ Crane strangled the memory with an internal screech of “Rain, Rain, Go Away”, and the brilliant reminder that it would get to be with Tetch soon! 

They went down the elevator with minimal stops, and they made it to that horrible little room with the glass wall. The last time Crane had been in here, its entire world had lit up as every nerve was fried with impossible-to-describe pain, and it’d needed to go to the medical wing to get twin wounds looked at. 

It shied nervously, not wanting to experience that again in case this entire visit was a  _ trick,  _ but it was very gently coaxed into the middle of the room by Forsythe and the guards. There it stood, nervously fidgeting and looking around; it craned its neck to look through the glass, to see if Tetch was on the other side. He wasn’t. 

“We’re going to bring him in after you,” Forsythe explained. “Dr Lyons and I think that the excitement was too much for you to handle all at once, and wanted you to be resting for a few moments before you see Jervis again.”

Jervis.  _ Jervis.  _ It wanted to see Jervis again so badly. It would even get tazed again, if only just a glimpse…

They waited what felt like an eternity. Crane fidgeted. 

“Bobby Shafto’s gone to sea,” Crane mumbled, rocking on its heels. “Silver buckles at his knee. He’ll come back and marry me. Bonny Bobby Shafto.” It wet its lips and continued when there were no objections: “Bobby Shafto’s bright and fair, combing down his yellow hair. He’s my love forevermore, Bonny Bobby Shafto.” 

The door on the other side of the wall hissed. Crane jolted, partially lunging forward, then stopped itself.

Calm, Forsythe had said. It didn’t want the barbs back in it, nor the electric fire that seared every nerve— and it didn’t want to get taken away from Tetch just yet. 

Jervis, as lovely and small as ever, was marched forward by his accompaniment of guards. The brightening of his face as soon as he spotted Crane was nearly enough to make it swoon. 

“Oh, dear, I did ever so want to see you!” Tetch exclaimed. He hurried right up to the glass, pressing his palm to it, and Crane was swift to copy the motion. The glass was cold and flat. Tetch’s hand would not be, but that was all Crane had, for the moment. “I begged them to let me see you, dearest, I did! Especially after that nasty shock they gave you!” 

Crane made a mock-sniffing sound, as if it were edging on tears. 

“Poor dear,” Jervis cooed. He stroked the glass tenderly, and Crane tried to imagine what the touch would feel like. “I’d get you some nice tea if I could.” 

Crane made a slightly wounded sound, testing how far it could prey on Jervis’s sympathy. 

After initial greeting was out of the way, they tried to talk to one another, but the communication was stifled. Their language was in touches and gestures as much as in words- particularly Crane’s- and without the ability to stroke the other’s hand, or the ease of companionship of sharing a chair or workspace, they may as well have been talking over the telephone rather than being in person.

(Most of the time they DID talk was spent was lamenting how lonely they were— then expressing extreme gratitude for being together again. Crane sang or recited a number of love poems that made the guards grumble or roll their eyes, but they weren’t for  _ them,  _ they were for  _ Tetch. _ ) 

“One minute,” one of the guards warned, after what did not feel like very long at all. “Then the room’s gonna be used for Bennett and Napier. We gotta clear out before then.”

Although their conversation may have been lackluster from the lack of contact, neither of them wanted it to end. 

“Surely you can give us a little more Time,” Jervis spoke to the guard, urgently. “He and I are finally on good terms again.” 

“I don’t care. We gotta clear out. You got forty seconds.” The guard said. 

Jervis turned back to Crane, pressing his hand against the glass. “Dearest, listen to me. You mustn’t cause a scene when it’s time to leave. If you get upset, they’ll separate us again. Do you understand?” 

Crane nodded, but it was not happy. Fighting would do nothing but make the situation worse, but it still was not fair- it was not  _ right-  _ to separate them so soon! 

It was taken back to its cell after the forty seconds were up- and it did not protest, despite how much it wanted to- and that night, it had vivid dreams of the Mad Hatter and opium. 

=

“I would say,” Lyons said, mildly, “that the second session went shockingly well in comparison to how other couples do Screen Door.” 

“Only because of my warnings to Crane,” Forsythe countered. “If this weren’t a controlled environment, everything would go much different.”

“True,” Lyons conceded. He removed his eyeglasses, wiped them with a felt cloth, and put them back on. “I’ve done my evaluation on my end. Other than the first session, every session after has been  _ peaceful  _ and  _ appropriate,  _ and I can see no reason to keep them unfairly separated anymore. It’s unnecessary cruelty, Vanessa.”

“You don’t think they deserve a little cruelty? You do catch more flies with vinegar than honey, I don’t care what the proverb says.” 

“Having  _ doubts  _ about your career choice, Doctor?” 

“No,” Forsythe said, plainly. “I think that evidence surmounts feelings, and evidence points to Tetch drugging and abusing Jonathan Crane. And I’ve read  _ your  _ reports- it’s a two-way street, isn’t it?”

“I think that’s irrelevant,” Lyons said. “The long-term benefits—”

They began rapidly talking over one another, each statement louder and more harried than the last. 

“— aren’t any—”

“—Crane is your patient and you should know—”

“— reinforce the idea to Tetch that—”

“— are you  _ blaming me—?” _

“— Maybe I am!”

Lyons halfway rose, glaring at her. “I’m putting in a request to the warden to open the Screen Door.” 

“You’re making a mistake,” Forsythe told him, firmly; she got up, and placed one hand on the doorhandle. 

“We’ll see,” was Lyon’s terse response. 

Forsythe left, and the door gave a shuddering  _ click  _ when it shut behind her. 

=

Sergeant Torres was trying to not grin underneath her helmet. 

She had a sneaking suspicion Briggs had put her here on purpose; acquiescing to her desire to see all of this play out. 

Well, it wasn’t  _ quite  _ what she had envisioned. No dramatic sunset, for one, because it was indoors and also very early morning, but still. 

It was a perfect movie moment.

Crane came through the door. Jervis came through a second one opposite Crane’s. 

There was a mingling cry of delight; one in Crane’s overjoyed, deep rasp, the other in Jervis’s higher, happy tone. 

They collided, and it was hard to say who was going to get bowled over by the force of the other; for a moment, they teetered like a nervous metronome, then ended up in a constricting hug that could probably break a lesser man’s bones. 

The both of them began to shamelessly weep, and Torres mentally turned the page on the romance novel in her head. 

She wondered what the next chapter’d be like. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops, I wrote four thousand words yesterday.... so you get this early! Consider it my graduation present to you!
> 
> ( Comments hugely appreciated! It's like writer currency, yanno? )


	14. Batty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Therapy session, dinner, and recreational time.

Doctor Forsythe, Doctor Lyons, and a battery of guards were overseeing a group therapy session on a blustery day in July; there would be six Arkham residents brought to the session, and it would be over in forty-five minutes. After, they would be returned to their cells to await the arrival of dinner. 

The first to arrive was Garfield Lynns- otherwise known as Firefly- who’d been caught and brought to Arkham a month ago after trying to replace the water from a fountain in Gotham Park with gasoline. He was his usual chirpy, unflappable self. 

“Hi, Reggie!” Lynns couldn’t wave properly with his shackles on, but he tried. 

“Hello, Garfield,” Doctor Lyons said, ignoring the furtive look Forsythe gave him. “Can you sit, please? We need to wait for everyone to arrive.” 

“Can do!! Who else is coming?” Lynns sat, but immediately leaned up on the edge of his seat in interest.

“You’ll see, Garfield,” Lyons said, kindly.

Lynns leaned back. It took less than ten seconds before he was fidgeting; pulling at his clothes and tapping his feet and looking around at everything. 

Not that there was much to look at: the group therapy sessions were held in small, off-white rooms with a half-dozen or so chairs that were bolted to the floor, and that was about it. No decor, no non-chair furniture, and the guards were as stony and still as gargoyles. 

“Garfield,” Lyons prompted, gently. The burned man looked up, distracted. “Here.” 

Lynns’s eyes lit up when he realized what he was being gifted: a fidget cube. With no small measure of glee he took it from the doctor and immediately began toying with it.

“You have to give it back afterwards,” Lyons told him.

“I will,” Lynns promised, engrossed with flicking switches. “Thank you, Doctor.” 

Forsythe was staring at Lyons, disapprovingly; the senior doctor hoped his expression properly conveyed his response of ‘ _ He’s my patient, not yours, I know what’s best for him’.  _

The door swung open. Lynns looked up, interested, and Harvey Dent was marched in. 

The man’s double-sided countenance looked as equally handsome and gruesome as always. He had once been an attorney- the most respected attorney in all of Gotham- but an accident that had scalded half of his face with acid had both caused physical scars and  _ mental  _ scars— fracturing him into the cruel Two-Face and the slightly more mild-mannered Harvey Dent. 

“Good morning, Doctors,” Dent greeted. He took a seat without being asked. “Where’s Doctor Gale?” 

Doctor Gale was another of the therapists; Dent’s primary one. 

“Doctor Gale is on leave,” Forsythe said. “As of three days ago.”

Concern momentarily took hold of Dent’s face. “What happened to her?”

“Nothing you need to worry about,” Forsythe said. “I’m sure she’ll tell you when she gets back, but this sort of thing is confidential.”  

The promise of her return managed to settle Dent, but he still looked ill at ease; like he was personally  _ troubled  _ by this news. 

For a while the only sound was of Lynns clicking at his fidget cube; then another person was lead into their therapy circle. A single guard escorted in a thin, weedy-looking mutant.

He wasn’t as severely afflicted as Croc, nor as unscathed as Poison Ivy; long feelers protruded from his forehead, mandibles curved forth from his mouth, and his overlarge eyes were oily-black and shiny. Tufts of dense fur sprouted from his shoulders and neck in a mane, and at his back were tremendous, purple-and-green wings, carefully bound with Arkham-issued restraints. He still had most of a human physique- two arms, two legs, for the most part humanlike features, and normal skin- but it was unmistakable that this was not an average man. 

“DRURY!” Lynns immediately yelled in delight, jumping to his feet. 

“GARFIELD!” Drury Walker, the Killer Moth, shouted right back. His captive wings rattled excitedly in their bindings. The two rushed forward to hug, then engage in a complicated series of handshakes and high-fives. “Oh, man, they got you?”

“Yeah, they got me,” Lynns admitted. “And they got you, too!” 

“Yeah, they did,” Walker nodded sadly. “Accidentally flew into the lighthouse again and Batman was just waiting there for me.”

“Oh, they got  _ me  _ because I tried to light the fountain in the park on fire!” Lynns’s eyes blazed, and the throaty rasp of his voice pitched in excitement. “I had JUST finished up with the gasoline when Batm—”

“Mr. Walker, Mr. Lynns, can you sit down?” Forsythe interrupted, patiently. “And, if you please, don’t discuss that particular vigilante. It can upset some of the other patients.”

“Right!! Sorry, doc!” Lynns fist-bumped Walker and sat back down, wearing a dazed, happy smile. Walker sat beside him. 

Dent finally looked up from his concerned glare at the floor. When he spoke, it was in the growl of Two-Face: “The clown’s not comin’ to this, right? I can only handle so much stupid in a single room.” 

“Mr. Napier isn’t allowed to do group therapy sessions anymore,” Forsythe told him. Too many people had been stabbed or injured, and frankly, everyone- therapists included- preferred to pretend he didn’t exist. The only staff who ever were determined to try to “fix” the Joker were new hires.

“Good,” Two-Face growled. “Two morons is my limit.”

Their next arrival was a very average-looking man; he had short brown hair, pale skin, thick glasses, and was not particularly ugly or impressive. He cast his gaze out at them all in slight disdain, then took a seat without saying anything. The guard escorting him seemed all too happy to breeze out of the room. 

“Mr. Kingor,” Lyons greeted. 

“Doctor,” Kingor- more commonly known as the Bookworm- nodded in acknowledgement, then crossed his arms and set his face into a snooty half-smile. 

Walker and Lynns, in the interlude, had begun pushing the boundary of just how much they were allowed to interact. Their impromptu game included nudging the other, getting nudged, nudging back, and repeating, with more and more force every time, until they were almost pushing one another out of their chairs. If the very physical nature of their activity weren’t enough of a tip-off, Lynns’s broken, wet-sounding giggles and Walker’s nasal snickering were both loud AND obnoxious. 

“Garfield,” Lyons called, sharply. The two of them froze, mid-nudge, like they’d just been caught graffiting by the assistant principal of their elementary school. “Please. It can wait until you’ve got recreational time, can’t it?” 

“Sorry,” Lynns muttered, throatily. His foot scraped against the whitewashed tile floor, mollified by the scolding, and he leaned away from Walker, who was pretending that he didn’t know Lynns at all. 

“I couldn’t get a therapy group without complete lobotomites?” Kingor complained. Dent made a noise of agreement. 

“Mr. Kingor, please keep things polite.” Forsythe told him.

“They don’t even know what  _ ‘lobotomite’ _ means. They don’t even know I’m  _ talking  _ about them. They’re troglodytes who don’t even have two brain cells to rub together,” Kingor went on, growing more crotchety with every word. “Where’s Edward? We  _ always  _ do group therapy together.”

“Edward is being evaluated right now,” Lyons told him. “He goes before the parole board next week.” 

“What!? He didn’t tell  _ me,”  _ Kingor said, slightly distressed. 

Two-Face brayed a very mean little laugh, earning a scalding glare from Kingor. “Guess he got tired of your book club as soon as he realized he could get paroled.” 

Kingor’s face colored, and he snapped, “A man with two faces, and yet, half a brain. How remarkable.” 

Two-Face growled, but did not rise to the bait. 

Their next arrival was Jonathan Crane, the Scarecrow, who was carefully directed to the seat furthest away from everyone else. It did not say anything as it was brought in, but even with its silence- or possibly because of it- the entire temperature of the room was brought down by a good ten degrees. 

“Hello, Jonathan,” Forsythe said, kindly. Crane looked up at her voice, its animosity-filled crimson gaze glaring a hole through her before it elected to look away. 

Even Walker and Lynns, usually too oblivious to be afraid, were bunching up next to one another and leaning away. 

“They took away his creepy voodoo doll this morning,” Two-Face confided to a cautious Kingor in a mutter. “Been in a bad mood ever since.” 

“Not to be rude,” Kingor leaned away from Two-Face, speaking loudly to Lyons. “But ought’n’t he be in a therapy session for  _ violent  _ patients? Most of us have  _ delicate  _ constitutions, and may not feel safe or comfortable with a man of his repute around.”  

With a very subtly triumphant smile, Lyons said, “It’s been decided that Crane has improved enough to no longer be considered a violent patient. With final permission from the warden, he’ll be moving to a new cell block.” 

These words appeared to agitate Forsythe, whose professional smile curved downward into a brief, sullen frown. 

“Can’t say I’ll miss your company,” Two-Face told Crane, who swung its head around to glare at him, suspiciously. “Here’s hopin’ your replacement can hold a conversation.” 

The dual-faced lawyer shook his head, slightly; he added in the softer, gentler voice of Harvey Dent: “It’s good you’ve improved this much. I mean it. I sincerely wish I could make strides like you.” 

Crane remained placid. 

Their final arrival- rounding out the group to a half-dozen— walked in with a single guard, like Walker. Said guard was beaming beneath her visor.

“You have a nice day, Mr. Langstrom,” the guard called on her way out, giving the new arrival a wave.

The final member of the group was Doctor Kirk Langstrom, who, by all rights, appeared like a forty-something father who had once played semi-professional football in his youth before deciding to become a part-time summer camp counselor. In truth, he was a skilled biologist who specialized in hearing, and his six-foot-seven, impressively muscular frame belied a very gentle, hardworking, and genuinely kind soul, who also happened to turn into an nine foot bat monster when stressed or frightened. 

That  _ bat monster  _ thing tended to turn people off at first, but his kindly demeanor and affable nature tended to make friends of everyone who’d ever spoken to him for longer than a single sentence. It was simply impossible to reconcile the idea of  _ savage feral bat-beast  _ also being the  _ big nice man who’d probably apologize when  _ **_I_ ** _ stepped on his foot.  _

“Hey, Doc,” Two-Face greeted. Kingor, usually too lofty to even acknowledge people, gave a respectful nod at Langstrom’s passing, and Lynns and Drury both gleefully yelled, “Bat-bro!” 

Crane even relaxed a little. 

“Doctor Langstrom, it’s good to see you,” Forsythe said. “If you’d have a seat, we can begin.” 

“Of course!” He sat between Scarecrow and Two-Face, taking the chair that very few people in the asylum would’ve dared sit on. “Today’s going to be a good day. I can feel it.” 

The peculiar nature of Langstrom was the fact that everyone in the room thought,  _ yeah, it might be,  _ and, subconsciously, perked up a little bit. As it turned out, the Man-Bat was just what was needed to thaw the chill Scarecrow had brought in with it. 

(Langstrom was immensely popular at group therapy sessions, because he was very good at diffusing tension, was well-liked by all, and was large enough that no one liked picking fights when he was around. There existed an unofficial waitlist to have him in any given group therapy session.)

“A good attitude to have, Doctor Langstrom,” Lyons said. “Doctor Forsythe, would you care to begin?” 

Forsythe nodded. “I know most of you know one another already, but if you’d introduce yourselves—? Starting with Garfield.” 

Garfield looked at them all, a vacant smile on his face. 

“My name’s Garfield!” He announced, breath deep and sucking. “Garfield Lynns! I think I like Firefly better, though! ‘Cause I light  _ fires, _ and I fly!” 

Walker and Crane nodded sagely, sensing this assessment was true, while Two-Face and Kingor exchanged looks, forming a bond over mutual feelings of superiority. Langstrom was paying rapt attention. 

“My name’s Drury,” Walker told everyone. “Drury Walker. The Killer Moth, somet—”  

“I’d ask that you don’t use your persona’s names,” Forsythe interrupted. Lyons nodded in agreement. “Just your real name will do. You’re  _ not  _ Killer Moth anymore, are you, Drury?” 

Walker looked a little uncomfortable at the question, and pleadingly looked to Kingor, who was the next person in line. 

“I. N. Kingor, at your service,” Kingor spared him having to speak, taking pity on his clearly underdeveloped brain. “I  _ do  _ prefer Bookworm, though. I really do.” Before Lyons or Forsythe could interrupt, he hurriedly added, “But, given the circumstances, you may call me Kingor.” 

“Two-Face,” Two-Face spat, corrected mildly after by Harvey, who said, “Harvey Dent.” 

Forsythe and Lyons exchanged a quick glance, uncertain if they should step in to stop this- with both’s thoughts ending up being  _ it’s not my patient-  _ and were almost relieved when it was Langstrom’s turn.

“I’m Doctor Kirk Langstrom,” Langstrom volunteered, cheerfully.

Everyone looked, expectantly, to the Scarecrow. 

“I’m a dingle dangle scarecrow with a flippy floppy hat,” It muttered. 

“Jonathan, your name, please,” Forsythe said, kindly. 

“I’m a  _ dingle dangle  _ scarecrow with a FLIPPY FLOPPY HAT,” Crane repeated, louder. 

“No, Jonathan. You’re not the Scarecrow here, you’re Jonathan Crane,” Forsythe reminded, gently.  _ “Jonathan Crane.”  _

Crane growled, like the rumble of a thunderstorm heralding lightning.

“Vanessa,” Lyons moved to her ear to mutter. “It’s not worth it.” 

“My patient,” She hissed back. “Don’t tell me how to treat him.” 

“Hey, it’s okay,” Langstrom was attempting to console Crane, who’d drawn its knees up to its chest, wrapped its arms around them, and was glaring sullenly around at them all. “We all know your name, you don’t need to say it if you don’t want to.”

There was a moment of pause, and Crane nodded, jerkily.

Forsythe gave Langstrom a little look of warning, and the man dipped his head submissively, recognizing her rank check. 

“Now that we’re acquainted, let’s talk about how we’ve all been lately. Half of you have had a consecutive stay at Arkham for longer than a year, and the other half came in less than six months ago.” Lyons took his spectacles off to wipe dust off of them, and placed them back on. “I’d like a retrospective, and a look to the future. Does anyone want to go first?”

“I’ve been here two years,” Dent divulged, slowly. When no one else said anything- and he was given prompting looks by Forsythe and Lyons- he went on. “I don’t like that it’s going to be three in December.” 

“Three is a perfectly fine number, Harvey. That number means  _ improvement.”   _ Forsythe coaxed.

“I don’t  _ like _ three,” Two-Face insisted.

“Think about it like this, Harvey,” Lyons tried. “After you get through three, you’ll have four, which is two twice.” 

There was a moment of pause; Two-Face chewed on what Lyons had said with a guarded expression, debating if he was being condescended to. There was a brief internal struggle before he gave a jerky nod, and his suspicious features smoothened into something pleased when he gave it genuine thought.

“I just got back in!” Lynns burbled, as soon as there was a lull. The fidget cube clicked cheerfully in his burnt fingers. “Julian says I’ve been here five weeks. He says today is Nunavut Day. I don’t know what Nunavut is!!” 

“Part of Canada,” Kingor supplied.

“I always wanted to go to Canada,” Lynns rubbed his chin thoughtfully, then nudged his seatmate. “Hey, Drury, do you think you could fly to Canada from Gotham without stopping?” 

“I think I need a passport to do that,” Drury said, “And I don’t think I have a passport.” 

“Oh my  _ Lord,”  _ Kingor interrupted with an impatient scoff. “It’s two thousand miles from Gotham to Nunavut at  _ least,  _ and nevermind your  _ passport  _ or  _ lack thereof,  _ you’re a criminal—” 

“I think we should get back on the subject,” Langstrom said, helpfully. Kingor gave him an initially withering glare that eventually shrank to a sort of begrudging nod. 

“Garfield, you mentioned you’ve just returned,” Lyons prompted. “Do you have anything to say about that?” 

“Yeah, I sort’a missed my meds when I was outt’a the pen,” Lynns admitted. “I can  _ do  _ stuff now!” 

Crane made an antagonized noise of disagreement, shaking its head. 

“What is it, Jonathan?” Forsythe prompted, gently. Crane’s blunt nails scratched up its pantleg, and it shuddered. Everyone allowed it a moment to collect itself, and it muttered, 

“Don’t  _ like.”  _

“Medicine?” Forsythe probed.

A nod. 

“Well, some of us are sane enough to not  _ need  _ to be strung out on clonazepam every time we get back into Arkham,” Kingor said, snippily. Crane whipped its head towards him, with a grumbling growl, and Langstrom leaned forward to block Kingor from view. Kingor was paling, beginning to realize he had spoken too loudly and too openly. 

“Mr. Kingor, you were warned to stay  _ polite,”  _ Lyons reminded. “Please keep your comments to yourself or I’ll ask the guards to take you back to your cell.” 

Crane settled back, and Kingor breathed a heavy sigh of relief. “Of course.” 

Walker was the next to share. “I’ve been at Arkham for, er… Mmm… I don’t remember, but it was recent. I guess it’s okay. I just don’t like my wings bein’ all tied up, because I can’t fly.” 

“I can’t fly in here, either,” Lynns provided, helpfully. “It sucks!” 

“Hey, Bat-bro, you ever miss flying?” Walker tried to lean over both Two-Face and Kingor to tap Langstrom on the knee. 

“Oh, no, not really— I could do that whenever I wanted, if I liked, but I don’t. What I miss  _ more _ is being able to talk to people whenever I want,” Langstrom said, ruefully. “But it’s okay. I’ll be able to once I’m out of Arkham, and that’s all I need.”

“Yeah, in eight years,” Two-Face muttered. 

“The time goes by fast with a positive attitude and a genuine effort at self-improvement,” Langstrom said, with a slight nod. “And I’ve served five of those years, Harvey. I’ll be out before you know it.”

“I  _ guarantee  _ I’ll be on Gotham’s streets before you will,” Two-Face sneered— he seemed to catch himself a moment afterward, and shook his head. “But who’s counting.” 

“Mr. Dent—” Forsythe said, tone sharp and serious.

“That wasn’t an  _ escape threat.  _ Calm  _ down,  _ lady. Min and Max are in here, and so are the rest of my associates. Don’t you think I would’ve left already if I could? Damn place’s getting harder to bust out of every year. This place used to be a revolving door for Joker, but he’s been in four months already and got no way out.” Dent folded his arms. 

“I don’t think this is appropriate discussion,” Forsythe insisted. Lyons looked as though he agreed. 

“He’s right, though,” Lynns added, raspily. “Nobody gets out these days unless the whole building explodes!” 

“Garfield, I’ll take the fidget cube,” Lyons warned.

“No!” He gasped. “Sorry! I won’t talk about it anymore.”

“Does that mean it’s  _ my  _ turn?” Kingor asked, a nasty edge of haughtiness to his voice. “It’s dull in here. It’s been three years and the library hasn’t been expanded nearly as much as it was promised to—”

“Yes, it has,” Lyons said. “We’ve been over this, I—”

“There’s no  _ new  _ books in the library! Only old and secondhand novels I’ve already read!” 

“Because they’re usually donated through a charitable organiza—” Forsythe began.

“They can’t donate  _ new  _ bo—”

“Mr. Kingor, lower your voice,” Forsythe warned. “Your library privileges have been revoked before and will be revoked again.”

“Oh, gracious, and miss out on all the literary material I’ve  _ already read?”  _ Kingor responded, sourly. He folded his arms. “...  _ Fine.  _ I’ll just submit another request.  _ Again _ .”

“Mr. Wayne may pick up the tab,” Lyons offered, encouragingly. “He’s taken to a lot of charity, as of late—”

“Sounds like him,” Dent sighed, wistfully. 

The session ran on with rampant, off-topic discussion, unclear meanderings, and more incessant bickering. It was a success, though, because no one hurt anyone else (at least not physically), and all members left the session freely without needing to be violently escorted.

… even if it did end up running a quarter of an hour longer than intended. 

=

Kirk Langstrom was trying to enjoy his fruit cup. He  _ really  _ was. The  _ vespertilio vampyrus  _ in him was thirsting, desperately, for peaches, and the craving was making his beard itch. 

At present, he was at a cafeteria table, densely clustered with inmates. He tended to attract company- not that they were unwelcome.  _ Quite  _ the opposite. 

“Well, I think if Batman were any kind of responsible, he  _ would  _ send them to school,”  Kirk responded, in reply to a question that had been pitched and then hotly debated for the past few minutes. “Besides, the Robins all seem educated…”

“Batman?  _ Responsible?  _ He has a cabal of  _ little boys in tights  _ running around kicking armed mobsters every night,” Charles Brown scoffed. “He’s not stupid. Sending them to public school would make them targets.”

“Homeschooling, then. Batman is intelligent. He could homeschool a child.” Paul Dekker pounded his fist on the table to emphasize his point. 

“He doesn’t have  _ time,”  _ Temple Fugate cut in to argue. “Batman must participate in normal society when he is unmasked,  _ and  _ he dons cape and cowl come night,  _ and  _ he must sleep at some point. There simply is not enough time for Batman to homeschool two or three children.” 

“He hires someone, then,” Edgar Heed rubbed his temples, pained. 

“But what about money? And secrecy?” Arnold Wesker ventured. His abject misery had been somewhat remedied since he first arrived; Kirk had made strides to make him comfortable in a social circle despite Scarface’s absence. “If he homeschools, the homeschooler probably knows he’s Batman, and Batman’s got to be r-rich enough to afford—”

“We already know Batman’s loaded,” Charles rested his chin on his hands in deep thought. “How else’d he keep replacing all his gadgets?” 

There was a murmur of assent from the felons. 

Without being asked, Edgar passed his fruit cup to Kirk, who wordlessly nodded. The next morning Kirk would give him his breakfast portion of powdered eggs. They had an understanding. 

“The first, second, and third ones went to school,” Julian Day divulged, saying it slowly, as if he were just starting to awaken from a deep slumber.

Every eye- even a pair of mostly-sightless ones- turned to Julian, questioningly. 

“Care to tell us how you know?” Temple enquired, politely.

“I’ve been charting it for years. The Robins are most active in the summer- beginning the first week of June, and ending in mid-August. It, coincidentally, coincides with GCUSD’s beginning and ending of the school year. They’re also more active- once again,  _ coincidentally-  _ during the spring, Thanksgiving, and winter breaks on the GCUSD’s calendar.” 

“Batman’s rich and his kids go to  _ public  _ school?” Charles snorted. 

“It certainly seems that way,” Julian replied, coolly. “Though, granted, many private schools in Gotham operate on roughly the same calendar.” 

“Well, that doesn’t mean that for  _ sure.  _ He could be homeschooling and doing it on  _ purpose,”  _ Paul snapped his fingers. “In order to  _ mislead  _ everyone.”

They all digested that a moment. 

In the interlude, Kirk gratefully savored a mouthful of soft, squishy mandarin oranges. The bat that lived in the current of his blood was momentarily sated, high off of fructose. 

“You might have a point, Paul,” Edgar admitted. There was a few begrudging glances around; Julian looked displeased that his findings, after years of careful plotting, had been undone in two sentences. 

“Oh,” Arnold squeaked, softly, and heads at the table began to turn. 

Joker was heading towards them.

He moved quickly, skulkily, like a raccoon that had already been kicked off a porch but was desperate to return. The guards were watching. 

He stopped before the whole table, smiling his wan clown smile. 

“Hey, fellas,” Joker greeted, cheerfully. 

“Hey,  _ buddy,”  _ Charles had dealt with the Joker most often out of the lot of them, and was the first to speak up. Joker didn’t typically slum it up with the D-tier members of Arkham’s rogue gallery, and the fact that he  _ was  _ had everyone on edge. “What’s it this time? Want more money you’re not going to pay me back?”

“No, nononono, see, I’ve been talking to Harv- you know Harvey, got half his face burnt off?- and I think he mentioned something interesting about a certain doctor.” 

A hand came down to touch Kirk’s shoulder. Joker’s hands were thin and even  _ weak _ \- at least compared to Kirk, who was built like a linebacker- but there was no doubt they were the hands of a killer. Kirk almost thought he could feel the blood on them- coating and clotting the sleeve of his jumpsuit- but tried not to show any rudeness. He suppressed a shiver. 

“Mind if I sit here?” Joker shot a toothy grin at Arnold, who was sitting on Kirk’s right-hand side. Arnold jerked away like the seat was on fire, and Joker took it. “Thanks. Next time I see him, I’ll let your boss know what a  _ good boy _ you’ve been since he’s been gone,  _ Arnie.”  _

Arnold was trying to not tremble. Kirk was trying to not be upset at the deliberate antagonizing. 

“I’m trying to get through my sentence without any trouble, Joker,” Kirk told him, gently. “Whatever it is Harvey said, I’m not looking to do anything that’d get anyone in trouble.” 

“Why don’t you hear me out first?” Joker beamed. “I even got you a little something, since I heard you  _ liked it  _ so much.”

From where it was hidden inside his sleeve, he placed a slightly squashed peach on the table. 

Alarm bells rang in Kirk’s mind, warring against the interest of his bat blood. Louder than that, though, was the prickle of irritation the sight of it brought. This was like tempting Catwoman with a mouse— a deliberate insult disguised as a bribe. 

Kirk was a  _ human,  _ dang it.

“Where did you get that?” Kirk asked, taking a calming breath. There were no peach trees in Arkham. They didn’t serve them, either, not whole like this. If Joker could get a peach in— 

“Oh, you know, I heard from a friend that you might like one, so I had it sent in.” Joker said. “I haven’t done anything to it, if you’re worried about that. I need you  _ alive.”  _

“Goddammit, I’ll call the guards,” Charles barked suddenly, slapping his open palm against the table. “Leave him  _ alone,  _ you cheap, pasty-faced assclown, or you’ll wake up with—”

“A kite up my rear? Please. I’d find a better gimmick before you make threats, Chuck.” Joker scoffed.

Charles  _ hated  _ being called Chuck— that was his breaking point. 

_ “GUARDS!”  _

Joker cursed. 

“Listen, Langstrom,” he growled, hurriedly. “Harvey said  _ you _ said you can turn your bat-bod on whenever you like. Yes or no?”

Langstrom didn’t say anything. Joker grabbed him by the front of his jumpsuit. 

“What’ll it take to get you into a raging bat monster for just a day, doc?” This close, Kirk could strongly smell cologne and toilet wine. 

_ “No,”  _ Kirk said, firmly, peeling Joker’s hands off of him. “I don’t  _ like  _ being Man-Bat. I’m not  _ going  _ to be Man-Bat. If you want a distraction, a diversion, or some other escape,  _ look somewhere else.”  _

Before Joker could say anything, the guards arrived.

The extricated Joker from the table— he hadn’t done anything noticeably violent, and he didn’t resist, so they pushed him off with a warning to not bother anyone; that was the extent of what they could do. He leered at them from a faraway table, where his girlfriend and his henches circled around him.

Charles folded his arms, visibly fuming. “Bastard. Comes over here when he wants your help, but not to pay  _ me  _ the forty thousand he owes.” 

“Horrible clown,” Edgar muttered. “Sunny side  _ down.”  _

“Ill-timed miscreant,” Temple said, righteously. 

“Waste of a birthday,” Julian hissed. 

“Bad, bad guy,” Arnold quickly scooted back towards Kirk, who gave the maximum gesture of affection men were socially allowed— patted him on the back comfortingly. “Gives me the creeps. Scarface thinks he’s a crazy jerk, too.” 

“He has no taste for color,” Paul complained. “Orange, purple, and  _ green.  _ He  _ deserves _ to be in Arkham for fashion crimes like that.” 

Kirk thought it was nice they could all bond over their mutual hatred of the least-liked person in the entire Asylum… but he got the feeling this wasn’t over.

When dinner was wrapping up, Kirk threw the peach in the garbage, no matter how much his mind told him to lengthen his fangs and dig in. 

=

On a blistering July afternoon, Crane retired to the shade of the tree in the rec yard. Tetch, who had been recently permitted recreational times coinciding with Crane’s, was laying securely in its lap. It was just the two of them, tucked in the gnarled roots, enjoying the momentary cool reprieve in the sweltering heat of summer. 

“Daisy, Daisy,” Crane sang, carding Tetch’s hair between its thin fingers. Tetch sprawled, gratefully receiving the affection, his eyes half-lidded. 

“Give me your answer do. I’m half cra-azy, all for the love of you…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments always appreciated! : D
> 
> (It's a fic's lifeblood! They're what keeps this running! Even a simple "I liked this" is everything to me!)


	15. Childhood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Old memories...

It was very hot that particular afternoon; the sun blazed almost  _ spitefully,  _ attempting to scorch the ground-dwellers in revenge for it having to be up so long. 

A young boy wiped sweat off of his brow, being mindful of the multitude of thorns bristling out of his gloves; the pile of recently uprooted shoots showed that, despite the prickles, he had ultimately wrested control of the garden out of the hands of the weeds.

There was a sudden flurry activity going on at the house, capturing his attention— he knew at once it was more arguing. Yet  _ again,  _ Mother and Father were shouting at one another loud enough to wake the dead. 

Boy turned his eyes back to the garden, plucking at weeds that weren’t there and straining for the sound of their yelling. 

“I’m  _ tired—”  _ Mother complained. 

“Used that one on me last night, too,” Father said, nastily. “Get in the damn cab.” 

Father noticed Boy, who had thought that he was being very inconspicuous at this point. Father had the peculiar notion that children shouldn’t be heard  _ or  _ seen, and the only thing they were good for was having the house magically straightened and all of the chores done without harassing his wife over it. 

“Boy!” Father screeched. “You’d better be done by the time we get back!” 

Boy gave no sign of hearing, but he did not need to. Father, screaming maniac he was, was assured enough in his position in the household to know that he needn’t seek out active subordination. 

Father snatched Mother’s arm, dragging her towards the truck. She gave in, willingly walking with him, and sat down heavily in the passenger seat. The whole truck swayed under Father’s weight when he sat, and after a minute or so, they’d driven off with a streaking trail of dust.

As Boy continued to pluck weeds, he counted silently in his mind. If they weren’t back in the next ten minutes, they wouldn’t be back for hours— but he still had to wait. If they’d turned around because they’d forgotten something and Boy wasn’t still out in the yard, he would receive a punishment unlike any other. 

Boy had been conditioned to not go in the house even when his parents  _ were _ there. Father was usually in his rundown study, smoking or drinking, and hemming and hawing over complicated paperwork that Boy could not be in the same room with, lest Father belt him for suspected sneakery. Mother would shoo him out whenever he tried to see what she was doing, loudly proclaiming that she was doing “women’s work” and he would grow up as a sodomite and a sinner if he tried to help her do “lady things”. Both of them, when Boy was spotted resting idle, would delight in giving him an endless supply of chores.  _ Sweep, wash, mop, feed, weed, launder, dust, chop, chase, harvest, scrub, clean—  _ this had given Boy a pathological avoidance of the household, since his parents rarely went outside unless it was for necessary farmwork, and if he was not in their direct line of sight, they would forget about him. When they  _ forgot  _ about him, that meant Boy could be left to his own devices— plucking flowers in the meadows, chasing critters in the forest, hunting bugs and frogs and tadpoles, cooling off in nearby ponds, only coming home to sleep or eat or do the expected chores. 

This delight in being outside did not equal  _ dislike  _ of everything indoors, though. 

When it had been twenty minutes, and the weeding was all but done, Boy hauled the harvest of pricklers to the pile that’d been building ever since there were weeds that needed weeding. He took his gloves off, leaving them in the barn, and went inside. 

It was cooler, though not by much; Boy took off his hat and fanned his neck with it, whuffing. He wandered through the hallways, finally ending up at the most coveted room in the household: the library.

The library was not used very much, not ever since Grandmother grew sick; she had been the only one to use it, and the one solely responsible for the collection of novels found within. Now everything was covered in a fine layer of silty dust; left in perfect poise, undisturbed by movement or bodies until Boy’s trespassing. Motes twirled in the light like little fairies when Boy passed by the window and its faded curtains; he headed to the shelf that Grandmother had told him was  _ his  _ shelf, for all of his books.

He looked through the thick-backed volumes, trying to properly select; he eventually settled on a thinner book, leatherbound and well-loved in the snatches Boy had been able to sneak into the library and grab it. Reading was not  _ discouraged,  _ exactly- otherwise Mother and Grandmother would not have taught him how- but both parents were of the mind that time reading could be better spent taking care of the household, and it was rare Boy got the chance to indulge.

He carefully shut the door behind himself and headed up the stairs, clutching the book to his chest. He relished the chance to step on every creaking floorboard and not get screamed at; loved being able to take his time sauntering up the steps, enjoyed not having his mother snap at him for “walking funny” or his father threateningly accusing him of stealing his liquor because of Boy’s awkward gait. 

Boy knocked, politely, and pushed his way in. The scent of lavender and jasmine, overpoweringly thick and cloying, rushed out of the room. Boy quickly shut the door to trap it inside.

Grandmother’s room was small and mostly barren, barring her large, lacey bed and a few wicker chairs arranged around it. Bundles of freshly-hewn flowers laid on every surface, and burnt-out candle stubs decorated the few spaces the flowers didn’t occupy. 

Boy took one of the chairs. The covers had been pulled up past Grandmother’s head, and the small shape of her body rising, ever so slightly, underneath it. 

Boy picked up a bundle of lavender and tucked the sprigs into his shirt, trying to not cough. Grandmother had begun to…  _ smell,  _ for lack of a better phrase, a few weeks ago. 

The reddish-brown stain coating the covers was the source, Boy suspected. 

Boy sat down on the wicker chair closest to her, opening the book. His nostrils were tickled by the petals as he inhaled, making him want to sneeze, but he fended off the urge.

He opened the book, flicking through the pages. Grandmother, when she was well, had come into his room to gently read him fables, poems, and storybooks when he was little; once she fell ill, it was only right for him to return the favor. 

“Humpty-Dumpty sat on the wall,” Boy recited, to her. “Humpty-Dumpty had a great fall. And all the King’s horses, and all the King’s men…”

And he read to her, paging through the book slowly, over the course of an hour. He did not look up at the ugly stain, nor flinch at the horrid smell, nor acknowledge the fact that she was completely lifeless and unmoving.

He just read.

And little Jonathan Crane did this for many, many years, until he grew wise enough to realize that normal families did not keep their deceased grandmothers locked upstairs on their deathbed. 

=

“You’re younger than I thought you would be,” Alice told him. 

“Younger?” Hatta looked down at himself, embarrassed, and defensively crossed his arms.

“I expected the Mad Hatter to be older. You don’t look old enough to be mad.” 

“It doesn’t matter how old you are in Wonderland— young or old, ‘ _ we’re all mad here’,”  _ Hatta recited.

“Hum! That’s what the Cheshire Puss said.” Alice responded, thoughtfully. 

“Besides,  _ you _ don’t look old enough to be wandering out by yourself,” Hatta told her, sternly. “Young girls should not be by themselves.” 

“Huh! My sister says the same thing,” Alice said, indignantly. “She thinks it’s improper. I don’t think so. I’ve been fine, even among mad people.” 

Hatta tapped the table, frowning at her. “What if someone tried to do something bad to you?” 

“Well, I think it ought to work itself out,” Alice said, mildly. “It always does.” 

Hatta’s mouth stuck for a moment, as he tried to think of something else to say. He wanted to keep Alice at the table. She was a very nice girl, and Hatta was in desperate need of friends. The Dormouse and March Hare weren’t enough anymore; not really. 

You see, Hatta was desperately lonely. So lonely. Lonely enough that he held his own tea-parties out in the woods by his home, complete with broken cups he’d taken from the trash, or wood and rocks that he made-pretend were sugar lumps or spoons. 

A distant sound perked his ears and broke him from his thoughts. He believed, for a moment, it was the crying of the Duchess’s baby, and he was about to apologize to Alice for the interruption— 

“Jervy! Jervy! You have to come in for supper, Jervy, I know you’re out here!” 

“Jervy?” Alice asked, unquenchably curious as always. 

“It’s nothing,” Hatta blurted. “Ignore it. You can stay, can you not?” 

“Well, I’d like some tea,” Alice said. “So I suppose I can. Just for a bit, though.” 

“Make sure she doesn’t eat too much bread,” The March Hare said waspishly. “It’s my bread, you know, and the finest butter, too. I don’t want to waste it on a silly girl.” 

“It’s fine, Haigha,” Hatta said, vaguely. “Dormouse thinks she should stay here, too, so she stays.” 

The Dormouse snored in agreement. 

“JERVY!! Jervis!! Come here, silly boy!” The voice was beginning to edge in annoyance, and it was getting closer. Hatta’s heart squeezed. He didn’t want to go. “Your father’s home, and it’s time for dinner, Jervis!” 

“Who is that?” Alice wondered out loud. She was pouring herself a cup, peering curiously out through the treeline. 

“A bad woman,” Hatta told her, shivering. “A bad, bad woman.” 

“Are we safe here?” The March Hare asked, speculatively. “We could move the tea-party deeper into the forest, you know. I could carry the butter if you get the spoons, Dormouse…” 

The Dormouse opened an eye half-way, yawning. “Oh, bother.” 

“Maybe we could talk to her,” Alice said. “I think it’s horrid she’s made you all so afraid.” 

“JERVIS!! Come HERE NOW!!” The saccharine-sweetness of the woman’s voice dipped, vicious and cruel and snarling. Hatta began shaking. 

“Oh— you look bad, Hatter.” Alice said. Her soft hands shook his shoulder. “Are you alright?” 

“No,” Hatta whispered, watching the large, silhouetted shape of the woman begin crashing through the undergrowth. He slid out of his chair, crouching low to the ground, cheek nearly touching the leafy carpeting beneath the table. “No, I’m not.” 

Dormouse hid in one of the teapots; the March Hare anxiously leapt from his seat, hunching down next to Jervis; Alice stood up, striding towards the looming, screaming figure stomping through the underbrush.

“Excuse me,” Alice said. “Excuse me.” 

The woman in the bushes turned around, calling: “Jervis?” 

“No, ma’am, not Jervis,” Alice said. “My name is Alice.” 

Hatta buried his face in his hands, tears beginning to run down his face. He began sniffling miserably, despite himself, and he could feel the Dormouse and the Hare leaving, evaporating like sunshine in shadow; the woman came closer, moving past Alice, who indignantly cried “Excuse me, miss—” 

The woman seized Jervis by the back of his shirt, hauling him up, and reproachfully slammed him into the tea-table. There was screaming, berating; her’s and Alice’s. But Alice could do nothing. Hatta—  _ Jervis—  _ could do nothing. His head hurt, he thought he might’ve been bleeding, maybe; most definitely blubbering like a baby. 

The woman- his mother- seemed to realize he wasn’t resisting. She brusquely picked him up and took him home, her grip tight as a vice the whole way. Jervis wept, loudly, and choked between sobs that she was hurting him; he was ignored. 

He kept trying to tell his father about it. But he did not listen. 

_ It’s none of my business how your mother disciplines you if you’ve been bad, Jervis,  _ he would say, in his infuriatingly calm, dispassionate tone. 

Jervis ran away many times before and after that incident; fled into the woods with Alice and the Dormouse and the March Hare, where he could pretend he had friends, where he could sink into Wonderland and pretend, at least, for a little while, that he was safe. 

His mother destroyed his copies of Alice in Wonderland when she realized what he was doing, of course, but that didn’t matter; he had memorized every line, every word, every picture, down to the absolute minute detail. 

She died when he was twelve. 

_ It was declared self-defense.  _

=

“Do you ever think about what life would be like if things were different, dearest?” Jervis was idly petting Crane’s head, reclining against their tree. “If the fates had not aligned so perfectly for us to meet— think about how  _ mimsy  _ life would be.” 

Crane grunted in agreement. It was currently lying on its back in the grass, head in Jervis’s lap. The guards had mostly stayed away today. 

“Mimsy,” It murmured. “ _ One is one and all alone, and evermore shall be so.”  _

“Ah, I haven’t heard that one before.” Jervis tilted his head. 

_ “Green grow the rushes, o,”  _ it explained in a murmur. It reached up, weakly, indicating its desire to hold Jervis’s hand; Jervis gave it freely.

_ “Lavender’s blue, dilly dilly, lavender’s green,” _ Crane sighed, sweetly.  _ “When I am king, dilly dilly, you shall be queen.”  _

And they lay there, quiet, content,  _ happy—  _

Whilst elsewhere in Arkham trouble began to brew. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments appreciated!


	16. Wildcard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Joker gets exactly what he wanted.

“I said  _ no.”  _ Langstrom repeated, tartly. 

“See, I’m not really a ‘no’ kind of man, batboy…” Joker replied. 

It had been like this for a while. Joker would confront Langstrom and slam him with constant, unending badgering— during mealtimes, during recreation, at any opportunity, really. Even showertime was not sacred, as Langstrom had now unfortunately realized. 

It wasn’t really possible for the Joker, a five-eleven, hundred-forty pound stick, to physically pin Langstrom, a 6’7, 250 pound goliath, against a wall; but he didn’t typically need stature in order to intimidate. 

“Well, you’ll have to be,” Langstrom told him. “I am  _ not  _ jeopardizing my sentence for you, son, I’m sorry.” 

The Joker’s lip curled.

He had undoubtedly hoped that he would throw Langstrom off by confronting him in such an  _ open  _ way- perhaps mistaking Langstrom’s “gee-shucks” mentality for naivety- and was agitated when it didn’t quite work out the way he wanted. 

The Joker drew back, and Langstrom straightened, fully intending to go back to his shower; he had rather long hair, and with the shower times they were given at Arkham, every second mattered. 

“I’ll get what I want eventually, Langstrom,” Joker hissed. “Remember that.” 

“I’d help you if I could,” Langstrom told him, truthfully. “Just not like that, Joker. I’m sorry, but Man-Bat is staying where he’s at.” 

Joker retreated, and Langstrom resumed his washing, albeit more warily than before. 

If Langstrom could only wait- outlast the clown’s attention span- Joker would get bored and find another target, as he always did; his attention was very erratic and flighty unless Batman was concerned. 

At least… Langstrom  _ hoped _ he would move on. Three years of constant badgering before his sentence was up… might cause him to crack.

=

It was a fine morning. Nine-thirty-nine AM, not quite late enough in the day to be hot just yet; but it’d undoubtedly get there. 

It was July 21st, with Kirk Langstrom having braved nearly two weeks of a constant onslaught of pestering from the Joker, thwarted by stalwart refusal, Arkham guards, or the presence of other inmates making a direct confrontation between Langstom and Joker…  _ tricky.  _

Today seemed like it would be a good day, though. Warm, but with a strong breeze. Most prisoners were by the walls, trying to shy away from the heat; notable exceptions being Jonathan Crane and Jervis Tetch, lying belly-down beneath their tree and, as far as Langstrom was aware, braiding daisy-chains. 

Langstrom always liked summer; and once he was out of Arkham, he swore he would never take the ability to go for a hike in July for granted ever again. At least from inside Arkham’s walls he could see the forest; the scent of pine and loam reached the grounds on some windy days. 

He sat down in the grass, closing his eyes and inhaling; scent in bats was a powerful tool, one that he only had vestigial dredges of since his last transformation into Man-Bat a half-decade ago. His nose was only slightly keener than an average human’s these days, but nevertheless it supplied him with the scent of the dirt, the grass, the dew, the flowers, and the distant forest; to get these small glimpses of  _ nature  _ was all he could ask for in Arkham. 

His peace did not last long, though. Footsteps crunched through the grass. Langstrom looked up. 

“Hey there, Langstrom,” Joker greeted, quite warmly. “Given our last couple conversations any thought?” 

The pale-faced clown seemed strangely…  _ off edge.  _ There was always a glimmer of frustration to Joker, of rage that would boil over at any moment. But it was strangely absent. 

With any other person, the lack of simmering anger would’ve been relieving. Now, Langstrom was alarmed. He quickly stood up, searching back-and-forth for an ally- a guard, a fellow prisoner- but none made themselves evident. 

“I have,” Langstrom answered, carefully. 

“And what do you think?” 

“I’ll have to decline,” Langstrom said. “I’m sorry, son, I really am. You’ll have to tough out your sentence like the rest of us.” 

Joker’s permanent smile widened. “You think so?” 

“Yes,” Langstrom replied. “I  _ am  _ sorry.” 

“Not as sorry as you’re about to be,” Joker tittered. 

Langstrom had a half-second to react; he moved to dodge, spotting the motion in Joker’s shoulders a split-second before the clown lunged. Joker feinted, leaning the same direction, and his arm swept up sharply. 

The pain hit, and for a moment, Langstrom thought he’d been punched; the breath seemed to have been knocked out of him, and a stripe of fire licked up from just beneath his ribs. It became evident quickly afterwards that he had not been punched— he had been  _ stabbed.  _ The handle of the whatever-it-was protruded visibly from his ribs, and Langstrom had a half-second of shock to stare at it before Joker pulled it back out, with an accompanying gush of blood. 

Langstrom cried out, stumbled, and collapsed. Instinct had him clasp his hand over the wound; the pain it caused had his hand jumping away nearly as quick. 

Joker knelt beside him.

“First stab wound? I’m not surprised. Everybody loves you so much that no one’d dare!” 

Langstrom’s breath was becoming labored. It  _ hurt,  _ and God, there was a lot of blood. 

“The guards probably heard you yelling, so let’s speed this up—” Joker took the weapon- a shiv of some kind, the tip wet with Langstrom’s blood- and attempted to pick at the edge of the wound with it.

Langstrom, injured though he was, was not helpless. He batted Joker’s wrist aside, knocking the makeshift knife out of his hand, and grabbed him by the throat, unable to resist squeezing.

A sudden wave of agony flooded from the scientist’s flank, and Langstrom groaned in pain, grip weakening; a moment after, Joker landed a sharp jab on his new stab wound, and Langstrom let go, falling backward.

“Going to have to do better than that,” Joker wheezed. He straightened up, rubbing his throat, and loomed over the fallen Langstrom. 

Joker gleefully brought his foot down on Langstrom’s ribs, a bright beaming smile overtaking his face; and as soon as Joker began applying pressure, Langstrom’s grip on humanity slipped and tumbled far out of his grasp.

=

An ear-piercing scream could be heard through nearly all of Arkham. 

Lieutenant Briggs, in the breakroom, dropped his coffee and swore. The other guards in the breakroom began frantically buckling their armor back on.

Batman, half-way through his delivery of Zebra-Man, narrowed his eyes and tightened his grip on Zebra-Man’s arm. 

The Ratcatcher, standing right beside Batman, winced at the sound, then opened his mouth to ask what that was. 

Lyons and Forsythe, in the middle of a meeting, paused, and exchanged brief, horrified eye contact. 

Harley Quinn, who was reaming into an inmate for pretend-tripping and using it as an excuse to grope her, hovered the heel of her foot over the man’s balls, wondering if it could be… 

Firefly and Killer Moth, who’d been having an unsubtle rendez-vous in the showers, put down their UNO cards and stared, wonderingly, in the direction of the noise. 

Croc stiffened on his cot as a bestial part of him recognized just what kind of creature made a sound like that. He curled up tighter. 

I.N. Kingor put down his book, sorely wishing that he could complain to the currently MIA Riddler about how this was a library, and noises like that were unacceptable. 

Arnold Wesker shrieked in fright and leapt into Temple Fugate’s lap, who was too mystified to stop him. The rest of the D-listers- Charles Brown, Edgar Heed, Julian Day, and Paul Dekker- all looked around at one another, uneasily, fairly certain of just who had made that sound… 

Two-Face, who was currently out in the yard, clapped his hand over his ears, swearing violently; he flicked a knife out of nowhere, eyes wide, searching for and quickly finding the source of the ear-splitting screech. His cronies, Min and Max, materialized from nowhere, ready to defend him from harm. 

Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter both twitched to life, stunned out of their grass-weaving. Scarecrow, instinctively, threw an arm over Tetch and jerked him back, preparing to face the threat head-on; only balking when it realized just what that threat  _ was.  _

In response to the scream, Joker began laughing. 

=

“Sorry, Doc; did that hurt?” Joker asked. Langstrom’s massive form was shuddering violently beneath his foot; blood had soaked through his jumpsuit and into Joker’s shoe. 

An obscene  _ squelch  _ sounded when Joker drew back his foot, and Langstrom’s fist slammed down in the grass to accompany a choked sound of pain. “Well, you should’ve made it easier on yourself in the first place. This is  _ your  _ fault.” 

Langstrom’s hands began twitching, violent and uncontrollable; then, with a fascinatingly grotesque series of crunches, his delicate little finger bones split right through his skin, beginning to lengthen and thicken. Langstrom’s face tore open, skull seemingly trying to dive right out of his body. A muted howl of pain left him; quickly accompanied by a much clearer, ear-piercing shriek that left the Joker momentarily deafened. 

The clown stumbled back, and his eyes left Langstrom for an instant; when they returned, skin had grown over the doctor’s new anatomy. His arms had re-articulated into massive wings, his mouth was filled with fangs, and he’d grown large enough to shred his uniform into clinging tatters. Fur swept over his form, and giant, fan-like ears had sprouted…

Massive, fist-sized eyes glittered with a mean kind of intelligence; tiny, pin-prick pupils set into bright brown irises slowly wandered up from the grass to focus in on Joker. Langstrom- or what  _ used  _ to be Langstrom- lifted itself up on its wings, and even on all fours, it was nearly as tall as the clown prince of crime. 

And that was about when Joker realized he might’ve miscalculated. 

=

The Arkham guard radio just about exploded. 

_ “Copy, copy! We have a situation, Joker and Langstrom, potential H—”  _

_ “Oh my God!”  _

_ “What the hell is that!? … Oh my God! What  _ **_is_ ** _ that?”  _

_ “Requesting information, can I please get—”  _

_ “Recreation yard one, south quadrant—”  _

_ “That’s  _ **_Langstrom?”_ **

_ “Please keep the channel clear—”  _

_ “-- keep it clear!? Do you see the eleven foot bat monster!?”  _

_ “Keep the channel clear, standing by for information— Do we have officers on the scene?”  _

_ “We have six officers, but it won’t be enough, requesting reinforcements—”  _

Batman tapped his comm, turning grimly to Otis. The Ratcatcher’s expression was unreadable behind his mask, but the way he was standing- poised for flight- said enough. 

“Find an officer, and help them escort Baker to his cell,” Batman said, tersely, giving Zebra-Man a light shove towards Otis. 

“-- Right,” Otis locked his grip around Zebra-Man’s upper arm. “But you’re sure I can’t help—?” 

“You’re not a match for Langstrom.” Batman didn’t have time to consider Otis’s feelings on this one; the key things were  _ get Zebra-Man in a cell, keep Otis safe,  _ and  _ neutralize any threat from Langstrom.  _ “Do what I told you, or you can forget about helping me again.” 

Otis nodded, sharply, then jerked Zebra-Man along, hurrying down a hallway. Distantly, Batman could hear him calling:  _ “Excuse me, guard? Guard? ……..Oh, no, I’m here helping Batman. Look, he gave me a little badge—”  _

His voice faded off as Batman sped down an opposite corridor. 

“Nightwing,” Batman tapped his earpiece. “I need you to prep the Batplane with the Man-Bat antidote.”

_ “Yeah, I’m on it— Arkham just went red, I’m gonna assume that’s related?”  _

“Yes,” Batman responded, curtly. He rounded a corner. “The south wing of the grounds.” 

_ “I’m on my way— but it’ll take a little time, Bruce.” _

“I can stall Langstrom until you get here.” Batman replied. “Batman out.” 

The Dark Knight’s mental map of the asylum was good enough to run unerringly through the labyrinthian hallways winding through Arkham; resulting in sunlight on his face in less than three minutes.

Three minutes, though, was a long time. Time Batman didn’t have. 

The south grounds were flat and grassy- bare with the exception of a few trees- and as a result, easy to survey. There was Langstrom, in the titanic form of Man-Bat, encircled by a phalanx of guards, who’d taken defensive positions behind hastily erected barricades. 

A shape was huddled almost beneath Langstrom, curled in a fetal position, shielding its face; the whiteness of their skin made it evident fairly quickly who it was, and Batman put together the rest of the pieces just as fast. 

Joker must’ve attacked Langstrom. Made him transform. But if that was the case…

… Why was Joker still  _ alive?  _

Batman had  _ seen  _ just how dangerous Man-Bat could be. The creature had a mouth full of knives, and enough muscle to tear a human being in two; Batman had seen it done the last time the beast had emerged. 

His answer came quickly; Joker produced something from up his sleeve, sleight of hand so fast Batman nearly missed it, and threw it a few feet into the grass. 

Langstrom’s over-large ears pricked, swiveling to follow the noise. Its eyes centered in on the thrown object in the grass; it took in a tremendous whuffing breath and leaned towards it. As Langstrom moved, Joker rolled out from underneath it- just before it would’ve trampled him- and the creature lowered its muzzle, delicately picking up the object Joker had thrown with its teeth— 

A peach.

It was promptly devoured, and the gigantic bat snuffled around the grass, searching for more. Joker, meanwhile, had gotten to his feet, shakily backing away from Langstrom.

Batman moved to the largest enclave of Arkham guards; among the number, he recognized Lieutenant Briggs, a red-faced veteran of Arkham who had seen more than his share of horrific happenings and explosive breakouts. Batman knelt beside him.

Quietly, the vigilante asked: “Have you already ordered someone to retrieve the Man-Bat antidote you keep here?”

Briggs jumped, startled by Batman’s abrupt arrival. Just as quickly, he relaxed. “Yes, but— the thing about that, Batman… we’ve never needed it before, and it’s going to take a little while to locate it and bring it back—”

“No need,” Batman cut him off. “The Batjet is on its way with a fresh dose of the serum. What I want you to do now is to order your men to retreat—  _ back  _ into the Asylum. I’m going to engage, and I don’t want any of you to get in the crossfire. I’ll alert you when it’s safe, and if I don’t come back in fifteen minutes—” 

He hesitated.

“Call Superman.” 

“Sir,” Briggs nodded, looking somewhat relieved, and gestured for his guardsmen to fall back. 

Batman stood, then edged forward, keeping a good fifteen feet of safety distance between himself and the massive bat. It didn’t seem to notice his movement- or, if it did, care that he was approaching- and continued its fruitless hunt for peaches. 

“Langstrom,” Batman called. The creature lifted its head, bright brown eyes questioning. It did not move from where it stood; bats were not very hostile creatures by nature, being social animals, and there was still a small glimmer of intelligence in its bestial features. 

Langstrom was a good man. He wouldn’t hurt anyone; not willingly. Batman just had to talk him down until Nightwing arrived with the serum. 

“Just stay still, Langstrom. Help is coming. It’ll be over soon.” Batman told him, soothingly. 

“Batsy, baby! You got here fast! Were you coming by to see  _ me?”  _

_ That _ would be Joker. 

The clown was on the other side of Langstrom, nervously backing up towards the fence to put some distance between himself and the two bats; though evidently not above ribbing in the face of danger. 

“Joker, be quiet and stay where you are,” Batman ordered. He couldn’t afford to take his eyes off Langstrom… but it was also a bad idea to not watch Joker at all times. “Langstrom is dangerous like this.” 

“I  _ know!  _ That’s why I stabbed him!” Joker replied, gleefully. 

He was obviously expecting to get a rise out of Batman; an incredulous snarl or a scolding for being an idiot. Batman did not oblige him. He’d already surmised Joker must have attacked Langstrom; no need to waste any breath to chide a clown already set in his ways. 

“Langstrom, can you understand me?” Batman asked. “Help is coming. You’re going to be okay.” 

The creature blinked at him; then, with a sound that was somewhat like a sigh, it slowly shifted, moving from a standing position to lie on its belly, wings folded. Its chin touched the grass with a certain weight, trusting brown eyes squarely locked on Batman. 

“That’s not right,” Joker was now clearly visible over Langstrom’s prone form, and his posture was tense, jaw stiff and furious. “Hey! That monster’s supposed to be causing mayhem! Killing people! Knocking things over! He’s not supposed to be just  _ sitting there!”  _

“Joker, walk around him,  _ slowly,  _ and surrender yourself to the guards,” Batman ordered. “And I’ll see to it that you’re only put in solitary for a couple months.” 

Joker scowled. 

In the blink of an eye, the clown had drawn an unknown weapon—  and just as quickly, the batarang Batman threw sank into the back of Joker’s clenched fist with a sickening squelch. The clown let out a string of profanities, gripping his wounded hand, which was beginning to gush blood. 

“Move around Langstrom,” Batman repeated, slowly, “ _ Carefully.  _ And surrender yourself to the guards. If you don’t, I’ll neutralize you myself.” 

_ “Neutralize,”  _ Joker spat. “You’re so  _ cold,  _ Bats. You only visit when you  _ want  _ something, you’re always saying the  _ cruelest  _ things. I’m beginning to think my therapist was right about you.” 

Joker wrenched the batarang out of his hand, and as soon as Batman could draw another, it’d been hurled into Langstrom’s eye. 

The bat had been quiet and still before that; as if on the verge of sleep. Waiting,  _ trusting  _ Batman to deliver his cure. 

Langstrom was certainly not quiet and still  _ anymore.  _ The shrieking was inhumanly loud and terrible, like a gathering of feral hogs were attempting to kill one another. The bat raged blindly, wings lashing in everywhich direction; an errant swipe knocked Joker over, throwing him a few feet and seemingly knocking him cold. Langstrom rounded on Batman, screaming bloody murder, wounded eye weeping blood. 

Reasoning was off the table now; Batman leapt backward, narrowly avoiding being battered by one of its wings as the bat advanced. 

The Dark Knight was too far from Arkham proper to try to escape to the rooftops, too out in the open to seek cover, and too under-armed to combat Langstrom head-on. It would take pin-point positioning and movement to have any chance of winning; his only choice was to stall Langstrom until Nightwing arrived with the cure, and to not die in the process. 

Langstrom charged at him in a loping, unsteady gait; Batman rolled to avoid, and the bat skidded past him, shrilling hatefully. Once it regained its footing, Langstrom circled back around, attempting fruitlessly to take to the air; it, like all bats, was improperly suited to take off from the ground, and it didn’t get very far in its effort, coming heavily back down to earth. 

It squealed at Batman furiously, but rather than attack, it galloped in another direction; it made straight for the Arkham fence, and Batman realized, blood running cold, that Langstrom could escape and wreak havoc in the  _ city.  _

It leapt at the fence, which creaked dangerously at the collision of such a powerful body; its claws hooked into the metal, and, after a moment of scrabbling for a foothold, it began scaling… 

Batman, seeing no other choice, fired his grappling hook at the creature. The tip pierced Langstrom’s leg, tearing through flesh and hooking itself in; Batman wound the cable around his arm, sparing a second of pity, and jerked with all of his strength. 

Langstrom screamed in agony, uncontrollably battering the fence with its wings. The metal buckled under the blows, and a support pole was nearly bent in two, but after a moment of tug-of-war, Langstrom lost its grip and was torn down from its perch, slamming into the grass. 

It remained still for a moment; jagged, snorting breaths coming fast and hard through its nose. After five seconds or so, Langstrom mustered its strength and rose. 

Its eyes burned with a sort of sorrowful hatred; it leaned its head back around, gnawing on the cable with a great degree of desperation. Batman jerked at the batclaw, sending Langstrom sprawling again, and the agonized cacophony it raised was nothing short of  _ painful. _

The familiar, though distant, roar of the Batjet’s engines caught Batman’s ear, and a deep sense of relief sank into his bones. He did not enjoy hurting Langstrom. Not in the slightest. He was _ glad  _ for it to be over. 

_ “Batman, I’ll be there in half a minute,”  _ Nightwing reported.  _ “The serum’s prepared; and a tranquilizer just in case.”   _

“Thank you, Nightwing,” Batman gave Langstrom a careful once-over. The creature was staring at him, but was not actively attempting to move; it was intelligent enough to know when it was caught, or else hated pain enough to not thrash when it was snared. “Langstrom, your cure is coming. I’m just sorry it ended up like this.” 

Langstrom’s muzzle pressed against the ground again, and it closed its eyes, as if accepting defeat.

It could have been worse. Much worse. The only person wounded seemed to be—

Batman’s eyes snapped to where Joker had been lying. The clown’s body had moved from where it’d fallen, and after scanning the landscape… 

He was on his hands and knees near Langstrom, attempting to carefully,  _ slowly  _ crawl past the creature and to the bars of the fence, where a sizeable gap had been made by Langstrom; just enough for a skinny body to slip through… 

“Joker!  _ No!”  _ Batman shouted. 

Langstrom’s eyes snapped open, and Joker must’ve made a sound; Langstrom’s entire head swiveled towards the clown, and the bat, without any hesitation,  _ lunged.  _

“LANGSTROM!” Batman jerked the grappling hook back with every ounce of strength in his body, and it was torn free of Langstrom’s leg with a spray of blood. “LANGSTROM!” 

Batman threw the grappling hook down and sprinted for the two of them, but it was too late.

Joker began screaming, and Langstrom fell upon him, fangs gleaming brightly in the morning light.

( The screaming rapidly became gurgling— any illusion Batman had of getting there before Langstrom killed him had gone, but Batman was running, yelling, regardless— )

An unexpected blow landed on the back of his neck, and Batman fell forward, landing hard on his hands in the grass. Momentarily stunned, he blinked the daze out of his eyes, trying to get back on his feet.

_ What hit me?  _

A second blow came down on Batman’s upper back, and he was knocked prone. 

A soft, lilting voice said, somewhere above him: “Dear, if you wouldn’t mind—” 

Thin- but still strong- arms wrapped around Batman’s neck, and cinched, tightly. Spidery fingers clasped over his mouth and nose with the intent to smother. 

The Dark Knight’s wits came together enough to realize what was happening, and who was assaulting him— he struggled against Crane for a moment, until training took over, and he slipped out of the Scarecrow’s grasp with practiced ease.

He gasped for breath, assessing the new threat in a split second: Jonathan Crane and Jervis Tetch, both presumably unarmed. Without their weaponry, Batman could best both of them in combat, even on a bad day. 

He just needed to suppress them, rendez-vous with Nightwing, inject Langstrom with the cure, and… see if there was anything left of Joker to save. 

_...Joker had survived impossible odds before… Who was to say he wouldn’t do it again? _

“Five little mon-keys swinging in a tree,” Crane sang. “Teasing little Alligator—  _ can’t catch me.”  _

It and Jervis had rushed at the same time; Crane’s arms wrapped again around Batman’s throat, whilst Jervis locked the Dark Knight’s arms behind his back. 

Batman struggled, and after a moment, spots began discoloring his vision. His lungs struggled to work. He fought against Tetch’s grip, trying to reach for his utility belt, but the tiny hatter was deceptively strong. Or, perhaps, Batman was deceptively weak. 

Maybe it was the earlier choking. Maybe it was Joker’s uncertain fate. Maybe he had taken a hit from Man-Bat and not realized— 

“Along came Mr. Alligator, quiet as can be,” Scarecrow rumbled. “And snatched that monkey out of that tree.” Its bicep cut harder into Batman’s throat as it redoubled its attempts to choke the life out of the vigilante. 

Tetch let out an absurd little giggle. “How doth the little crocodile improve his shining tail! And pour the waters of the Nile on every golden scale! How cheerfully he seems to grin—” 

_ Batman was beginning to fade… but the whine of the Batjet’s engines was loud, buzzing in his ears, nearly drowning out Tetch’s poem.  _

“How neatly spreads his claws,” Tetch and Crane hummed together, their voices mingling in a strange, dissonant harmony. “And welcomes little fishes in—” 

_ Bruce couldn’t see anymore. His lungs burned with an indescribable pain, and the last reserves of his strength had gone. Nightwing was his last hope.  _

_ Bruce held onto that, even though the rest of his body told him he was dying: Nightwing will come. Nightwing will save you. _

“— With gently smiling jaws!” 

_ =  _

Batman came to a little before Nightwing found him; the sight of Dick’s black boots greeted the vigilante when his eyes cracked open, and a faint headache prickled his temples. His throat was raw and painful, undoubtedly bruised from the strangling; the one positive thing was- surmised from Nightwing’s presence and the sunlight- that his lapse in consciousness had been a minute at most. 

“Bruce,” Nightwing whispered, with the inflection of an oath. He sprinted a few steps, then dropped down beside Batman, hands hovering, uncertain what to do. Bruce rolled on his side, very slowly pushing himself up; his head spun, dizzily, still oxygen-deprived. Nightwing moved, without being asked, to support the older vigilante. “What  _ happened?”  _

“Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter,” Batman grumbled, voice raw and wheezing. “They attacked me while I was dealing with Langstrom.” 

Speaking of…

Batman cast his gaze out to where he’d last seen Man-Bat. The beast was gone, and so were Crane and Tetch. The broken fencing sat there rather pointedly as the means of their escape.

The only person who  _ hadn’t  _ escaped lay in a puddle of blood in the grass. 

Nightwing followed his eyes, expression morphing into something unreadable. 

“Is that…?” 

Batman nodded, tiredly, and motioned to get up. Nightwing knew better than to protest or fruitlessly command him to rest; he aided Batman, taking on some of his weight, and the two of them hobbled over to the Joker’s motionless body. 

The clown’s bright green eyes were glazed over, staring sightlessly at the sky; his face- what little could be seen underneath the splashes of blood- was contorted into a frightened gasp. The massive fang-marks in his throat and chest made it fairly obvious that he was dead, but even so, Batman knelt, searching for a pulse in his wrist since his neck was so gored… 

“Bruce,” Nightwing said, quietly. 

They both knew there would be no pulse. 

Batman rose, with Nightwing’s help, and looked back out at the broken fence. 

Langstrom, Scarecrow, Mad Hatter…

He was going to have his work cut out for him. 

__

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh fock he's focking DEAD


	17. Apples

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Joker is dead.

The Joker’s funeral was small. 

No one from Arkham was permitted to attend, for obvious reasons. It was private- not open to the public or the press for safety concerns- and quiet, held on a hot July morning; most of the police force who could stomach it were there, as well as Batman and all of his living proteges.The Ratcatcher was present, but arrived alone and did not mingle with anyone; as though he wasn’t certain he was allowed to be there. The ceremony itself was remarkably short, and the words that were said by the attendees consisted mostly of recounting horrendous things the Joker had done. Many expressed relief- catharsis- now that he was dead. 

Commissioner Gordon gave a sobering speech about how an oppressive weight had been lifted off of their backs, but there were still criminals and the police force couldn’t afford to get sloppy. Detective Bullock snarled a long rant that boiled down to “good riddance”, met with rousing cheers of agreement. Nightwing was the only member of the Batman extended family to speak; he mourned the loss of Jason Todd and countless others at Joker’s hands, and finished his speech with a quieting conclusion about how this had probably been for the best. 

Batman did not speak.

After the funeral, Joker’s remains were interred at Arkham cemetery, in a plain urn underneath an unengraved headstone. He had no existing will, and there was no tally of all the things he owned or who he was leaving them to. They would, presumably, fall into state custody. 

News coverage of the funeral swirled. It had begun to sink in that Joker was well and truly dead; no switcheroo, no practical joke, no punchline waiting to sling. The clown prince of crime was gone. 

Cops punched the air in delight. People whose loved ones had been taken from them finally smiled. The seedy underbelly of Gotham breathed a collective sigh of relief at the debts that could now be left unpaid, or else cursed Joker’s name for running up a tab that couldn’t be settled. The colorful rogues gallery housed in Arkham’s walls either celebrated or mourned, depending on who was asked. Harley had to be put in solitary confinement in order to not be a danger to others.

The biggest question raised by Joker’s death went unanswered, despite all the media coverage: the identity of his killer. Most had presumed Batman, in a fight gone wrong, or else one of the Arkham staff in a fit of desperation. No one outside a small minority knew the true murderer: Kirk Langstrom, the Man-Bat. 

And it would stay that way. 

Both before  _ and  _ immediately after the Joker's burial, Batman occupied himself with two other concerns; Man-Bat, who’d flown away and was likely dying of sepsis or blood loss by now, and the Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter, who’d fled on foot and seemingly disappeared into thin air. Neither thread was very long. Man-Bat had last been seen flying south, with one sighting two days after his disappearance, but nothing since; the Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter hadn’t been sighted at  _ all  _ since their breakout, and could’ve been anywhere in the country by then. Or even  _ outside  _ it. 

Batman started his search with the easier of the two: Langstrom. 

On July 24th, three days after the Joker’s death- the day of his funeral, and a day after the last Man-Bat sighting- Batman went south to a relatively small apple orchard in Delaware. It was where he was bound immediately after the service, as a matter of fact. 

He did not invite the rest of his entourage after declaring his intended destination; denying Red Robin, Robin, Batgirl, and Nightwing the trip with him. Instead, he’d gone up to the uncomfortable-looking figure pretending he wasn’t even at the funeral-  _ Ratcatcher _ \- and strongly implied that Ratcatcher should accompany him. Ratcatcher, uncertain about why  _ he  _ had been allowed and the others had not- but also unwilling to let Batman down- agreed to go. 

You wouldn’t catch Flannegan complaining about being chosen above Batman’s trusted and loyal sidekicks, but the silent discomfort permeating the long drive was rather off-putting. Batman spent the duration of the ride even more stoic and silent than usual, and it was all Otis could do to draw his limbs tight against his body to avoid touching anything that might accidentally cause the Batmobile to explode. He’d ridden in it once or twice before, but it never got any easier. 

They arrived at the orchard around noon. On the way in, they could see countless rows of apple trees; the apples were small, barely visible amongst the leaves, and definitely not ready for consumption just yet. 

They parked in a clearing in front of an old, slightly decrepit-looking farmhouse. It had a banner firmly strung on the porch: 

_ AUGUST 30 - OCTOBER 30 UNLIMITED APPLE PICKING 1 DOLLAR PER POUND BRING YOUR OWN BAGS _

Underneath it was a smaller, more hastily erected sign: 

_ COME SEE WHERE THE MAN-BAT WAS SIGHTED, 1 DOLLAR PER PERSON  _

Batman got out, and Flannegan followed. They walked up the dirt path to the farmhouse; Batman’s knuckles had scarcely grazed the door before it opened. A small, portly man in jeans and a plaid shirt met them, red-nosed and face pocked with age. 

“Morgan McGilli—” He stumbled for a moment, taking in their appearances. It was difficult to discern whether he was more caught up by Batman’s unapologetic costume or Otis’s hybridized Ratcatcher-funeral ensemble. Either way, Morgan made an admirable recovery: “—Ahem, Morgan McGillicuddy.” He offered his hand, which Batman briefly shook. “We’re out of season for apples right now, so you must be here for where I saw the Man-Bat, right?” 

“Yes,” Batman said.

“You’re one of the first few to see it,” Mr. McGillicuddy told them. “It’s only a dollar each for a tour, and I’ll tell you what I saw, too.” In a conspiratorial tone, he leaned forward, and added: “There’s some things I kept to myself, so the people wouldn’t just read the papers and be done with it.” 

Batman began reaching into his utility belt; Otis pulled out his wallet before Batman could find the money, and handed over two crinkled bills. 

“Yessir, that’ll do it,” McGillicuddy said, with a smile. He tucked the money into his pocket, then headed down the porch stairs, motioning for them to follow. 

Batman exchanged a brief look of disapproval with Otis, who replied in a quiet whisper:  _ “It’s only two dollars.”  _

“This farm has been in my family’s name for generations,” McGillicuddy began, swelling with pride. They started walking through the orchard, on a path past countless apple trees that had been planted in neat rows. Undergrowth was minimal, if not non-existent. “Since 1750, at least. My many-great grandfather was a personal friend of George Washington! We even have a letter from Mr. Washington framed up on the mantle inside, if you’d like to see that.” 

“Once we’re finished,” Batman said, agreeably. “Can you tell us anything about the creature you saw two nights ago?” 

“Oh, the bat? Sure,” McGillicuddy beamed back at him.  “One of  _ your  _ relatives, I’d wager.” 

He chuckled to himself heartily. When Batman and the Ratcatcher did not laugh with him, McGillicuddy’s merry demeanor sobered. 

“Ahem. It was a little after sundown— a bit after nine, maybe?— I was calling the dogs back in when I heard an odd sound…” He trailed off a moment. “Like a bunch of rutting hogs fighting over something. I went back in the house, grabbed my shotgun, a flashlight, and my camera. Poor dogs ran up to me, howling like crazy, and I caught sight of something  _ huge  _ in between the trees—”

In the bright summer afternoon it was difficult to be well and truly afraid, but McGillicuddy’s expression made the sunshine seem dimmer. 

“Nothing like I’d ever seen before,” he said, as if to himself. “Bigger than any man. It had its face up in the branches. Was eating the apples, I think, even though they won’t be ready for awhile— I really thought it was a bear or something, but when I got close, it looked a helluva lot like a bat, just blown up a hundred times size…”

“And then?” Batman prompted.

“Well, the damned thing flew away before I could get a good look at it,” McGuillicuddy said. “But there was a summer storm earlier in the evening, and it left footprints. Clawmarks, too, on the trunks— and I took pictures, even if they didn’t turn out too well.”

“I’ve seen them,” Batman said. “Hard to make out.”

“Yeah, well,” McGuillicuddy gave an impotent shrug. “It was dark, I was juggling the camera and the gun, and the damn dog was tripping me up—”

“Did you try to shoot it?” Batman asked. He caught sight of their destination; it was marked off by yellow tape, ringed around a cluster of trees.

“No,” McGuillicuddy admitted. “Didn’t occur to me until it was well out of range. I mean, it was running— flying— away. Couldn’t have been that dangerous…”

“Mmm.” 

“Oh! That’s it, up ahead.” McGuillicuddy helpfully pointed. “I cornered it off with tape yesterday morning, so no one would trample over the tracks.” 

“That was considerate of you,” Batman intoned. The farmer grinned.

“Thought folks like you would want to come look,” he puffed. “Even though the sheriff wouldn’t even dignify it with a glance. He thinks it’s a hoax, and isn’t worth his time. I thought that was crap. It’s not as though he has anything better to do—”

They’d arrived. Batman gave a cursory look at his surroundings: 

_ There were no visible blood splotches anywhere. Man-Bat must’ve stopped bleeding by the time it visited the orchard. _

“Did it rain again any time after you saw the creature?” Batman asked. 

“No. I don’t think it’ll rain again in quite a bit, either.” McGuillicuddy answered. 

_ There were tracks in the drying mud, though relatively few of them. The imprints on the left and right were not of the same depth; one was consistently shallow, and the other consistently deeper. Man-Bat was limping, which was congruent with the wounding Batman had given it with the Batclaw.  _

Batman lifted the tape, stepping inside the enclosure. Otis and McGuillicuddy remained behind. 

The trees’ trunks bore deep scars; even from a glance, Batman knew they matched the depth and texture of Man-Bat’s thumb talons. Higher in the trees were tooth marks, bitten into the boughs, leaves, or the wrinkled apples still left on the branches. 

_ Man-Bat’s depth perception was off to leave this many misjudged bitemarks; the work of its eye injury.  _

“Which way did the creature go?” Batman asked. 

“Southwest,” McGuillicuddy said. “There’s some hills out that way.” 

“Thank you,” Batman said. He hadn’t found anything that was incredibly helpful in the search, but at the very least he’d corroborated that Man-Bat had been here. “I think that’ll be all.”

He slid back under the tape, then strode towards Otis, who was studying a light footprint just outside the cornered off patch of earth. 

“What do you think?” Batman prompted.

Otis looked up at him, then away. “I’m not a detective.” 

“That’s not what I asked,” Batman said.

“Langstrom was here,” Otis begrudged. “His scent is stale, but still present in the air. The little babies can smell his blood— his pain-scent, his fear-scent. They don’t know where he went.” 

“Is that all?” 

Otis closed his eyes a moment. 

“It’s… hard to separate specifics from the usual anxiety… but the rats here are afraid.” He paused, opening his eyes, and murmured: “Poor little babies…” 

“Once we find Langstrom, we can stop that,” Batman reminded him. 

“And we will,” the Ratcatcher mumbled. Louder, he said: “I could ask the rats to guide us to him.”

“They know where Langstrom is?” Batman asked. 

“I… I don’t know,” Ratcatcher backpedaled, uncertainly. “Let me try something.” 

He stood still for a moment, and his eyes glazed over; then, just as quickly, they brightened up. 

“They know,” the Ratcatcher muttered, scrubbing his hand down his face. “They know.”

=

Batman had seen a lot of odd things in his time. The Martian, J’onn J’onzz, was about half of them, but a considerable other portion included alien spaceships (Thannigarian, Kryptonian, Martian, the list went on), magic (from the pedestrian, like Zatanna and John Constantine to stranger forms, like Brother Night and Etrigan), and many other incomprehensible forms of utter madness.

Having a young janitor divine the location of a gigantic bat-human in the Delaware hills via rodent-telepathy didn’t even break the top ten. But he thought it might be close.

“It’s… a little difficult to stay on track,” Otis’s expression had become icy, even as perspiration glittered on his skin. They’d been hiking for quite a ways now, and he was clearly unaccustomed to spending extended periods outdoors. “Rats don’t quite think like you or me.” 

“How  _ do  _ rats think?” Batman entertained the question only since it seemed as though Otis had more to say. Talking seemed to calm him. 

“Simply,” Otis answered. He was using his staff as a walking-stick, and he started leaning on it more heavily. “Their minds work  _ ever so _ simply. But there’s a… a  _ logic  _ to it, once you experience enough of it.” There was a short pause, and he carried on: “I think anybody could talk to rats like I do. But they don’t.” 

Batman had his doubts. He was of the belief that Ratcatcher’s ability was unnatural, no matter what he’d convinced himself of. 

When Batman didn’t continue to push Otis about rat intelligence, the two lapsed into silence, continuing to trudge on with minor course corrections. They’d left the apple grove quite a while ago, venturing into a forested countryside that was, in McGuillicuddy’s words, “out in the hills”, which happened to be the flattest hills the Dark Knight had ever seen. 

Birdsong and rustling in the undergrowth kept the walk from being silent, but there was an underlying cord of tension. As the quiet between them dragged on, it became clear Otis wanted to broach the same subject that all of Batman’s apprentices had been trying to tactfully raise:

“I’m glad Joker’s dead.”

Otis was looking ahead, speaking to the woods rather than Batman. 

“He did the most horrible things to those innocent little babies, just to get to  _ me _ ,” Otis continued. “I told you that story when we met. He was burning them alive. And we  _ both _ heard all the stories at the funeral— how many humans he’d killed.” 

“Ratcatcher,” Batman said, tersely, “I need you to concentrate on finding Langstrom.”

Batman was not interested in this discussion. He had denied all the Robins and Batgirl the right to go in hopes of avoiding this exact topic, in fact, trusting Ratcatcher to be uninvested in the Dark Knight’s emotional state. 

“You didn’t speak at the funeral,” Otis said hurriedly, rushing on as though he were afraid he’d be interrupted. “If you need to talk, now’s the—”

“ _ Flannegan.”  _

Otis shrunk back a little; the omnipresent rustling in the undergrowth abruptly stopped rustling, only resuming when the Ratcatcher worked up the nerve to go on. “He meant a lot to you, Dark Knight, even if it wasn't a good meaning. Rats don’t like seeing other rats get killed, even if it means they get the cheese on the other side of the trap.” 

“I’m fine,” Batman told him.

_ It just isn’t how I thought he’d die.  _

Otis had the good sense to not press the issue. 

“We’re close,” he said, after a few more minutes. “Just a moment.” 

He knelt; a moment later, a scrawny, mangy-pelted grey rat came streaking out from beneath an overturned log. Otis held his hands out expectantly and it scrambled into his palms. With seemingly not a sound or motion exchanged, Otis looked up, expression nauseated.

“What is it?” Batman asked. 

“Langstrom is dying,” Otis said. “The rats have smelled his sickness— a wound of his is infected, and they think he’s too weak to live.” 

Gently, he put the rat down, then straightened and turned to Batman. His expression had become muted and sad. “It isn’t much further to him now. This one can take us there.” 

They had to match pace with the rat, who lead them to a thicket of collapsed trees, piled in an almost tent-like heap. It had been done recently, since the edges of the leaves had yet to brown and moss hadn’t yet grown over the jagged stumps. 

Underneath the pile of logs was Langstrom. 

The bat appeared asleep, its good eye closed, the other weeping pus and small traces of blood— infection had already begun to set in. Around it were piles of moss and leaf-litter, partially raked over its form like a blanket. A scattering of tart, unripened apples lay near its snout, uneaten. Just barely visible was the rise and fall of its chest; when its lungs expanded, the fur on Langstrom’s back scarcely brushed against the bark of the trunks piled over it. 

“Otis,” Batman breathed, carefully, “I’m going to inject him with the cure.  _ Do not move.”  _

“He’s going to die,” Otis said back, quietly. “I’m sorry.” 

“No he isn’t,” Batman murmured, and that was the last word on the subject. He drew closer, trying to muffle his path through the underbrush. Langstrom’s good eye opened at the sound regardless.

It made a soft, understated churr deep in its chest. It didn’t so much as lift its head, either comprehending Batman was here to help or accepting the futility of struggling. 

“I can help you, Langstrom,” Batman said, quietly.

_ This is the thing that killed Joker. Not me, like he always wanted. Not himself, like I always thought. Just a mindless, injured beast… _

In a way, though, Joker had killed himself. You couldn’t throw yourself into the lion’s den and be shocked when they bit you.

_ But if you hadn’t called out to him— if you had just let him escape— Langstrom may not have noticed him. He might’ve escaped. He might’ve lived.  _

Langstrom’s eye slid shut. 

_ Lived to kill more people? Lived to go back to Arkham, break out, and kill again? Lived until he killed me? Killed Barbara and Damian and Dick and Tim just like he killed— _

He stopped that chain of thought there, and knelt at Langstrom’s neck. To comfort, Batman stroked the wild mane of hair on the Man-Bat’s back and shoulders; the skin underneath rippled at his touch, and Langstrom gave a deep exhalation. 

“Just hold on a little longer, Doctor Langstrom,” Batman told him, quietly. “You’re going to be okay.” 

The only places Batman could readily reach on the bat were its neck, upper back, and face, the latter two coated with a thick protective layer of fur. None of the three were ideal for an injection site, but extracting the bat from the logs would be a lot harder than clearing a patch of skin. 

Grimly, Batman retrieved a batarang from his utility belt. The metallic click of it unfolding caused Langstrom to open its eye and look up at him; it was filled with a glassy, unprocessed horror, and the bat tried to weakly lift its head in protest.

“It’s okay, Doctor Langstrom,” Batman said, quietly. He gave a gentle, reassuring stroke to its fur. “It’s okay. I’m going to help you.” 

Langstrom settled. 

Batman cut away a swath of thick hair as close to the skin as possible without causing injury, then prepped the antidote gun. He pressed it flush against Langstrom’s skin, and the creature tensed at the contact.

There was the pneumatic hiss of the mechanism firing, covering the soft sound of liquid punching into flesh. Langstrom gave a surprised squall at the sting, but didn’t thrash; trembling hard as the fluid drained into its bloodstream. 

“There,” Batman said, relieved. He put the jet injector back into its holster, and backed away a few steps. He turned to Otis- who was watching anxiously from the sidelines- and gestured him closer. 

It took mere moments for the change to begin. The bat contorted, body beginning to undulate; it let out a broken-sounding screech, and its wing-tips dug into the litterfall, carving unintentional furrows in the ground. Its bones shifted with ugly creaks and cracks, contorting into a more human shape. Its fingers shrank, its skull recessing into the snubbed profile of a human being. 

Batman undid the clasps on his cape, sweeping it off his back in one smooth motion and placing it over his arm. Langstrom would be wanting it once he was himself again. 

The fur dusting the creature’s back lengthened into Langstrom’s hair, and it fell in a curtain around his head. The webbing between his fingers dissipated, and any remnant of a tail receded into Langstrom’s lower back. 

Once the grueling transformation was over, Langstrom slowly looked up at Batman and the Ratcatcher, hair falling around his face, revealing two healthy brown eyes full of sorrow. 

A slurry of word-salad left him, a tangled combination of human consonants and batlike trills; his eyes widened in horror, and he clapped one hand over his mouth. Emotions crossed his face faster than they could be categorized— confusion, horror, grief, pain,  _ fear.  _ His eyes started to glisten with tears, and he rapidly shifted from lying prone to sitting, clasping his other hand over the first. The beginning tears of confusion and terror had already begun to run down his cheeks.

“It’s alright, Doctor Langstrom,” Batman said, carefully. He knelt, offering out his cape. Langstrom took it, wordlessly, wrapping it around himself like a safety blanket. “Give yourself a moment, then say whatever you were trying to say.” 

The effects of repeatedly becoming Man-Bat had not been studied, for obvious reasons. Langstrom, before Man-Bat, had the typical flat canines and rounded ears of an average human. After his first transformation, he’d been left with permanent fangs and pointed ear-tips. It was not out of the realm of possibility that  _ this  _ change had robbed him of speech.

For Langstrom’s sake, Batman hoped it didn’t. 

“You can understand us, right?” Otis prompted. Before Batman could rebuke him for unhelpfulness, Langstrom nodded, smudging a tear-tract with his thumb. “It’s June twenty-fourth— three days after you became Man-Bat.” Helpfully, the Ratcatcher added, “We’re in Delaware right now.” 

“You’re safe,” Batman reiterated. “We’ll take you back to Arkham. No one except a very small group knows about—” 

“Joker,” Langstrom gasped, prying his hands off his face. “Oh, God. Oh, Lord in Heaven— Man-Bat, I—” 

With shaky delicacy, he traced his finger-tips over his teeth, pausing at his fangs. “I killed Joker. Oh my God.” 

“No one knows,” Batman repeated, forcefully. “Just me, the Robins, Batgirl, Ratcatcher, and a trusted coroner. No one on the police force, and no one at Arkham. As far as everyone knows, Joker was planning a breakout, you escaped in the chaos, and I killed him while trying to stop him.” 

“That’s not right,” Langstrom wiped his reddened eyes with his wrist, protesting despite himself. “It was  _ my _ fangs in his neck, you can’t possibly expect me to let you  _ lie  _ about that—” 

With the utmost gentleness, Batman laid a hand on Langstrom’s shoulder. As softly as he could manage, Batman told him: “Langstrom, if Harley finds out you were the one who killed him, a lot more people than you are going to get hurt in the crossfire.” 

Langstrom blanched. 

“It’s better this way,” Batman told him. “Less people are going to be hurt.” 

He straightened up, and Langstrom, using a nearby log to support himself, managed to get to his feet. 

“Are you up for a hike, Langstrom?” Batman asked.

Langstrom’s gaze wandered across the leafy canopy overhead in a stupor. Bleakly, he said, “Going on one was all I wanted three days ago.” 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're in the endgame now, folks. I expect the next chapter will be the last.
> 
> It's been fun! I'm kind of thinking about doing an extended universe to tack onto this one; going over the continuing relationship with Ratcatcher and Batman, Killer Moth and Firefly, and even some hereto unmentioned characters, like Mr. Freeze and Nora, Toyman and Lex Luthor, and Gentleman Ghost and Riddler. 
> 
> We'll see!!
> 
> Please comment, it fuels me :)
> 
> ( thank-you to my mother for her support and proofreading; and thanks to the wonderful darkwingsnark for getting me involved in this community again after a bit of a hiatus! i'd almost forgot how loving and welcoming the DC community is c:> )


	18. Runaway

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Out of one nightmare, into another.

Scarecrow looked up, weakly, as Tetch approached. It crooned, softly, hope in its eyes as it searched Tetch’s form. 

“Poor dear,” Tetch cooed. From the folds of his coat he withdrew a small package wrapped in paper, passing it over to Scarecrow, who took it greedily. “I’m sorry it’s so little, dearest. It’s all I could get.” 

Scarecrow began carefully unraveling the paper until it could excavate the treasure within, which happened to be a slightly squashed deli sandwich. It fell upon the food in delight, tearing at it like a ravenous dog, and within moments, it was gone. Guilt shaded Tetch’s face even deeper. 

“I’m sorry,” he repeated, moving to sit beside Scarecrow. He patted its thigh, but whether to comfort it or himself was uncertain. “It’s all I could get.” 

The Hatter’s usual crooked smile had been replaced with a crooked frown ever since they’d had the fortune to escape Arkham; Scarecrow hated that frown. Hated that Hatter had lost weight, too; his curves were becoming less curvy, less familiar. The darkness of his eyes, the gauntness of his cheekbones, and the filthiness of his form were all unpleasant reminders of their current state of affairs.

Oh, escaping Arkham may have been a boon, but being outside its walls was certainly  _ not.  _ Their faces were plastered everywhere; papered wall-to-wall in some areas. They’d be recognized, caught, and taken back to Arkham if there was so much as a hint of hat or burlap. 

Batman had found a crusade- a torch to burn- and it was making Scarecrow  _ miserable.  _

“One apenny, two apenny, hot cross buns,” Scarecrow murmured, staring morosely at the paper. It scratched up a shred of lettuce that still clung to the crinkles and nibbled at it. “If you have no daughters, give them to your sons.” 

“We will manage,” Hatter insisted, quietly. He was staring at the cracked brick across from them, but not really  _ looking  _ at it. “We’ve been through worse, love.” 

Scarecrow struggled to think of worse. This was the longest their misery had been  _ prolonged,  _ instead of very intense and very short. It thought it would’ve preferred breaking more bones, tangling with the bat, to quietly wasting away like this. 

They’d been living in a dry (for now) sewer tunnel, out of the public eye and tucked so far from normalcy no one would ever find them. The stench was horrible at first; now, on the cusp of three weeks of hiding, it barely registered. 

The Scarecrow had doubts about their living arrangements. Constant, unspoken, nagging. Was this better than prison? Was it  _ really?  _ Scarecrow had wondered if, for Tetch’s sake, it should turn them in. It knew Tetch had likely had the same thoughts, the same doubts; perhaps even more than Scarecrow had them, since he was softer, more accustomed to comfort. 

The reason they were  _ in  _ such dire straits was, to Scarecrow, tacitly unfair. Their old hideout had been found. Scarecrow’s things,  _ Hatter’s  _ things, had been confiscated only a week after their escape from Arkham.

It was rotten luck, not conspiracy, that had found them; a new company had bought the land their decrepit warehouse stood on, and company employees had ventured in to see just what they had just purchased. The police and Batman had been on the scene in one phone call, and then all of the fugitives’ things- their home- were gone, and the two were driven underground. In the same twist of fate, chance had kept them from being home at the time; thus, they had been spared being captured. 

Again, the Scarecrow’s thoughts turned, cyclical— they may have been better off being taken back to the asylum. Freedom only  _ really  _ felt free if you could go where you liked, eat whatever you wanted, and live as you pleased. With freedom like  _ this,  _ there were just as many restrictions as there were in captivity. 

But they had each other. Which they  _ didn’t  _ have at the Asylum. 

Scarecrow lifted itself unsteadily to its feet, reaching for the scraggly blanket they’d suspended from the ceiling; the criminal managed to tug the fabric free, then sat down and wrapped it around the both of them. Tetch gratefully cuddled into Scarecrow’s side, and a pang of helpless rage cloyed the Scarecrow’s throat. 

An idea struck it. A place they could be safe, could be free, surfaced; a place that it had not thought about in a long time. A place that felt like a mental slap to the face. 

_ — knees-in-grits blooming-pain-from-head grandma’s-body grandma grandma — weed-pulling —  _

It had not been there, where it was born, where it was  _ raised,  _ since it was very small. It didn’t even want to think about it. Too many ghosts. Too many old memories. Too much badness, too much pain. 

_ But it would be safe.  _

There was food there, too. Scarecrow remembered peaches, juice trickling down its chin and stickying its hands, the thick snap of carrots and the softness of ripened tomatoes. There was food. There was safety. There was  _ no Batman.  _

It sat there until the faint slats of light overhead dimmed to nothing; until day waned into night. 

In that time, the Scarecrow thought, long and deeply, desperately trying to come up with a better, more practical solution. 

_ They should have left Gotham ages ago. There was nothing here left for them. They had been degraded so far that they were scurrying around like rats in the sewer— miserable, filthy, starved. They needed to go somewhere else.  _

_ So why  _ **_not_ ** _ there? Why not where it had been born? It was quiet. It would just be the two of them. There would be no Mother, no Father, no body in the bed upstairs. It would be safe. There would be food. It would be warm. Scarecrow could show Tetch where it used to catch toads in the summer. They could get horses and pigs and chickens again.  _

Scarecrow glanced down at Tetch, uncertain. It made no difference in the dark; not even straining the edges of its eyes provided a distinguishing shape. It knew, even without sight, that Tetch was asleep; the soft breaths and stillness were indication enough. Scarecrow needed to wake him; to share its plan, to explain what it wanted to do. 

Scarecrow made a guess in the dark and attempted to gently caress his cheek, making a slight noise to try to rouse him. Tetch didn’t stir, and so it repeated itself, louder.

_ “Rmmmhhh,”  _ it trilled, prodding him more firmly. 

“Mmm…?” Tetch drowsily grasped at Scarecrow. “Oh, goodness. Is that you?” 

“Yessss,” Scarecrow assured, voice creaky. 

It hesitated a moment; it would be hard to explain with borrowed words. It started on what Forscythe had attempted to spend years teaching it: the phrase “ _ I want…”  _

“I want to…” It paused, clenching its fists. It would not get frustrated.  _ “Rmmm.  _ Over the river and through the wood, to Grandmother's house we go—” 

“Sorry?” Tetch yawned, shifting to sit up. “I don’t understand. You want to go somewhere?” 

“Grandmother’s house,” Scarecrow insisted. There was a beat of silence.

_ “Your  _ grandmother’s house?” Tetch enquired, gently. 

_ “Yesss.  _ I don’t like here.” Scarecrow’s stomach felt soured. It was still hungry, and the taste of peaches played, phantomlike, on its tongue. “And this little piggy cried  _ wee, wee, wee  _ all the way home.” 

“You know the way?” Tetch checked. 

“Yesss,” Scarecrow hissed. It was seared into the criminal’s mind. It could  _ never  _ forget. 

“You want us to go…  _ now?”  _

“Yes,” Scarecrow was already moving to get up; it reached for Tetch’s hand- fumbling in the dark until it found a warm palm- and pulled him along after it.

The next few hours were a blur. They ascended to the surface, thousands of lights twinkling to keep Gotham, an unsleeping city, awake; they sidled through shady alleys, past people lying prone in corners and the things skittering in the shadows. 

There was a man leaving a twenty-four hour grocery store. He was piling things in the back of his truck. Looking around. Weary. Nervous.  _ Alone.  _

Tetch distracted him- pretending to be a confused tourist- while Scarecrow crept behind the man and smothered him. It didn’t know if it killed him, and it didn’t matter. It just held on until he stopped kicking, and a little longer after that, in case he was playing dead. Scarecrow carefully dragged him to the dumpsters behind the establishment while Tetch flicked through the man’s keyring, raided his wallet, and selected choice cuts from his groceries for the two of them to eat upfront. 

_ (“I didn’t know you could drive,” Tetch said, sounding skeptical and possibly even slightly afraid for his life when they piled into the cab. Scarecrow grunted in reply. It could not properly provide directions for Tetch to get there, which necessitated it driving; otherwise, it would’ve left that mess to Tetch.) _

There were headaches on the way. Maps, bathroom breaks, stops to refuel, abandoning the truck to repeat the theft with another person in case a report had been filed for it. Eventually, Scarecrow agreed to let Tetch drive (only after they’d gotten their maps in order) then took a long, disorienting nap that didn’t make it feel much better when it woke up. 

There was lots of classical music and news commentators adding to the monotony of the road. Scarecrow felt immensely groggy, and paradoxically,  _ restless,  _ the whole time. It had not been built for long car rides, even if Tetch seemed to have been. 

The  _ Hatter  _ took to the trip like a duck to water, humming along to songs and interjecting his political opinions alongside the chatty men and women on public radio. Scarecrow couldn’t fathom exactly what the arguments about Lex Luthor’s candidacy meant, and it didn’t much care to. Tetch seemed to be opinionated, and it felt assured that it was taking the right side by nodding along to whatever he said. 

It had been a sixteen hour drive by the time they arrived, at that dreary liminal point between afternoon and evening. Scarecrow stumbled out of the car, relieved to be on its own two legs, and Tetch stared, with naked surprise, at what lay before them.

Scarecrow’s home had always been decrepit, even when inhabited. Held together by elbow grease, nails, baling wire, and an endless rotation of repair. Looking at it now, though…

The years of abandonment had not been kind to it. Plants were growing in the second-story gutters, creepers were climbing up the cracked and rotting walls, and around the house was a thick carpeting of yellowing grass, nearly two feet tall. No discernable path could be seen through the blanket of vegetation, meaning the both of them had to wade through it to get to the house.

Without a word exchanged they gathered up the few things they had brought with them, then forged towards the structure, trudging through the weedy grass. Scarecrow privately waited for the Hatter’s judgement. It wouldn’t be long before he gave it. He couldn’t help himself. 

“It looks… as though it needs some work,” the Hatter admitted, once they’d reached the porch steps. Ivy had grown over the stairs, which likely would’ve given way under their feet without the support. “When were you here last, dear?” 

Scarecrow grunted. It did not know, exactly. It enjoyed not knowing. For Hatter’s sake, though, it estimated: “Eight and eight, and other eight.” 

“Twenty-four years?” Hatter glanced up at it in surprise. 

Scarecrow hesitated, head weaving back and forth in thought. That seemed about right. It nodded. 

“How… How old  _ are  _ you, exactly, dear?” 

Scarecrow ignored the question and reached for the doorknob. It was unlocked, though it dragged on the floor and had to be forced open. A sudden snap of anxiety seized its spidery limbs, and it propelled itself forward, wrenching its hand from Hatter’s grasp. Hatter’s surprised outburst was ignored, and dust spun in the Scarecrow’s wake as it headed for the library. 

It threw the door open and plunged itself into the room. 

The curtains were faded. Dust caked every available surface. Plants had broken in through the shattered window panes. Light spilled in messily from jagged holes in the ceiling.

_ But the books were all still there.  _

The Scarecrow stood there, paralyzed by relief, until it became aware of Tetch standing in the doorway.

“Dear?” Tetch prompted, gently. Scarecrow turned to face him. “... A library?” 

There was a wordless nod, and Scarecrow drew towards him, wiggling its fingers in a frantic, spontaneous request to hold his hand. It was freely granted. 

“Would you like to show me around, dear?” Tetch asked, soothingly. “Or would you prefer to settle somewh—” 

Scarecrow pulled him along after it, out of the library, and began an impromptu tour. It couldn’t help but make excited huffs as it went, throwing its crooked arms in every which direction, stabbing a finger at various doors and giving incoherent rhyming rambles in explanation. Tetch carefully held onto his hat with his free hand as they sped through most of the downstairs areas, only letting go when Scarecrow’s spontaneous energy waned. It balked at the staircase.

“Nhhhh,” it growled, to itself, grasping the stair railing for support. “No-o-o.”

“Dear? Whatever is the matter?”

“Don’t go up there,” the Scarecrow spat, in a voice that did not sound like its own. It was clear,  _ clean,  _ though gruff with a masculine inflection. In the softer, weary tones of a woman, it murmured, “She’s not up there anymore, Jonathan. The neighbors…”

The banister cracked under its grasp, and it seemed to notice then that it had been clenching its fist. It shook its hand, and droplets of blood and splinters of wood went flying. 

“Oh, dear, your hand!” Tetch admonished.  _ “‘Oh, you foolish Alice!’ she answered herself.” _

Scarecrow grunted, turned from the stairs, and stalked back towards the front door. It did not let go of Tetch’s hand. “There was a little boy went into a barn, and lay down on some hay. An owl came out and flew about, and the little boy ran away.”

“I don’t—” Tetch began.

_ “Barn,”  _ Scarecrow snapped back. Its patience was wearing. Coming here was not right. They shouldn’t have. It wasn’t too late to go back to Gotham—

_ Grandmother’s bed is still up there, still up there, still up there— _

_ Father is yelling it isn’t fair, isn’t fair— _

_ Mother is crying let go her hair, let go her hair, let go her hair— _

_ And Boy is screaming he really cared, really cared—  _

Scarecrow’s nose stinks of mud and its hands are tacky with frog slime. Its skin is burnt by the sun and its cheek is stinging with the slap its father left. The sun is hot and the river water is cold, and Scarecrow is squeezing the frog, because it is afraid that Father will find it, beat it, demand it go back into Grandmother’s bedroom to sing to her rotting carcass until its throat gives way. 

_ Normal families don’t have their dead grandmothers in the bedroom upstairs.  _

“Ghngh,” Scarecrow croaked. All of that had been in the blink of an eye. It staggered, and pushed its way out of the house, liberating itself from the snare of memories. It stumbled through the grass, on the route seared into its mind, gripping Tetch’s hand tightly.

_ They would be safe in the barn.  _

They had always been safe in barns. There was one in Gotham, years ago, that it had taken Tetch to… barns were for horses, yes, horses and hoards and Jervis Tetch, but not fathers or mothers or grandmothers.

The barn was up on the hill, within sight of the house on a clear day, but far enough away to be an inconvenience. The paint was patchy and dulled, and the wood had begun rotting, but its silhouette was still strong and clear. 

“Dear,” Tetch said. 

Scarecrow ignored him, forging through the grass. Its long legs were hardly slowed. 

_ “Dear,”  _ Tetch repeated, louder. 

Scarecrow scarcely heard. They were getting closer to the barn, just a few strides away. 

“DEAR,” Tetch snapped, temper flaring. Scarecrow liked ignoring him whenever he was angry. Sometimes it worked and he would stop. 

Its hand had just brushed the rusted handles on the barn door when Tetch’s fist collided with its thigh. It flinched, stumbling a step or two backward, and its hand was pulled free of Tetch’s grasp.

“DEAREST,” Tetch trumpeted, at the maximum volume his tiny frame would allow. “You’re being  _ rude!”  _

Scarecrow stared, slowly lowering its arm to its side. 

“‘How queer everything is to-day!’” Tetch spat, glaring. His voice grew more frenetic with every word, bouncing up and down with anger. “‘And yesterday things went on just as usual. I wonder if I’ve been changed in the night? Let me think: was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I ’m not the same, the next question is,  _ Who in the world am I? _ Ah,  **that’s** the  **_great—_ ** _ puzzle—!!” _

Tetch’s fury-stricken face demanded an answer; one Scarecrow could not give. Could not possibly hope to articulate aloud. 

It stared at him, trying to force the proper words, but it was hard to conjugate all the pain of its upbringing even in its own head. It blinked blurry tears out of its eyes; the blow to its leg suddenly  _ hurt,  _ and hurt a  _ lot,  _ and it couldn’t remember being struck in the chest, but  _ that  _ hurt, too. 

It raised a sharpened finger-nail, and etched an honest expression of its feelings into the flaking barn paint: 

:(

Tetch stared at the face for a moment, as though it were a cryptic hieroglyph of an impossibly ancient language, then looked back at Scarecrow questioningly. 

Scarecrow obliged him: 

:( :( :( 

“The house,” Tetch said. “What happened there, dear? What was so monstrou—?” 

“No,” Scarecrow croaked. “No.  _ Barn.” _ Sing-songed, it recited: “There was a little boy went into a barn, and lay down on some hay—” 

It had done that many, many times. It was like running away, with all the scary parts taken out. No, no, no. The Scarecrow didn’t get scared, you see. The Scarecrow scared other people.

Tetch’s expression was unhappy. He was not satisfied by the Scarecrow’s answer, but it could not give him a better one; instead, it would comfort him. The Scarecrow knelt, so their eyes were level, and gave him a reassuring kiss; it lingered, longer than it ought to have, and Scarecrow eventually stood. 

Tetch still did not appear satisfied, but that could not be helped. They’d need to move on.

The Scarecrow tugged the barn door open, holding it- in its opinion- rather gallantly. Tetch stepped through with an acknowledging incline of his hat. 

It was just as Scarecrow remembered. 

“Dearest,” Tetch whispered, “It’s all of your  _ things.”  _

Tetch was not far off. Scarecrow was fond of building hoards- immensely fond- and this had been its prototype. Everything even tangentially related to the things it’d read in storybooks were here; dishes, spoons, mittens, candles and candlesticks, fossilized cross buns, lockets, small sculptures of bridges, cowbells, shoe buckles, oranges and lemons that’d rotted away, playing cards, sticks, stones, feathers, wheels from a community bus, preserved flowers, ladybugs and spiders pinned to paper, a broom, and a myriad of tokens taken from any variety of creatures: pigs, cows, cats, robins, geese, doves, frogs, owls, roosters, donkeys, mice, weasels, sheep. 

“An  _ aeroplane?”  _ Tetch asked, in disbelief. A tarp had been thrown over it, but the star collection of the hoard was a brightly colored biplane, surrounded on all sides by the rest of Scarecrow’s things. “Where did you—?” 

“I flew it,” Scarecrow rumbled, voice tinged with pride. Quietly, it chanted: “Ladybug, ladybug, fly away home.” 

It ambled over to the hoard, then knelt; it dug around for a moment, then produced a playing card. Hatter took it, staring at it a moment, then caressed his hand down down its face.  

_ The Queen of Hearts.  _

He tucked it into his pocket, then glanced around the barn. The uncertainty-  _ frustration-  _ on his face sloughed off.

“To begin with,” the Hatter said, “We’ll need a nice tea-table…” 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, and please let me know what you think. 
> 
> Comments are a writer's currency, and even though finishing this fic is a foregone conclusion, attention really does help authors work.


	19. Strange

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not if Smettleberg has anything to say about it!

What was happening out at the Crane household?

It just wasn’t right. 

Nathaniel T. Smettleberg, Junior, was not about to let this kind of thing slide. 

It wasn’t right for people to go around occupying houses that weren’t theirs. Smettleberg felt an instantaneous, righteous bolt of indignation at the very idea. If people went around taking up houses that didn’t belong to them, he might have to give up his own house to some stranger, and sir, that’d been in the family for generations. 

It made little difference to Smettleberg that the house had gone unused and completely abandoned for some fifteen years, and that the Cranes had dispersed of their own volition and left the house abandoned. Nobody had taken up residence in those fifteen years, so it was the Abandoned Crane Household, and it should stay abandoned until Ma Crane and Pa Crane came back for it. It was the  _ Crane’s  _ home, after all.

Even if the Cranes were a bit weird. There’d been a scandal some years ago, where Ma Crane and Pa Crane had been discovered… Doing something. Smettleberg was twelve when it was found out, and his Ma and Pa hadn’t exactly elaborated on what it was. Something Bad, with a capital B, but whenever they’d come into town the little Smettleberg had only seen them looking nice. Pa Crane was tall and sturdy, always looking like one of those heavyweight champs Smettleberg saw on TV, and Ma Crane was thin and wispy, like if she missed her next bite to eat she’d fade into nothing. She would politely say hello to Smettleberg, sometimes give him a treat if they’d been out shopping long, and Smettleberg coveted it like no other. The Pa Crane smelled like cigarettes, and was the epitome of manliness and virtuosity. Smettleberg had wanted to grow up to be Pa Crane, even if he had actually ended up a bit more like an overripe pear. 

Anyhow.  _ The Crane Household.  _

About a week ago, Smettleberg had been crossing into the Crane territory to check how the crops were developing— the overgrown forest of apples would be ready soon, and Smettleberg had taken his kids there every August since the Cranes had gone (since it wasn’t as though the Cranes were using them) to go apple-picking. While on his  _ way  _ to the orchard, he had noticed something a little odd— 

There were  _ people  _ out there.

Smettleberg ducked behind a tree, his portly figure not quite covered, and peeked out to see them. 

There were two of them. Both men, he thought, though he could be wrong. One of them was garbed in all black, but his clothes were raggedy and stripped, so when he moved there was the impression of a million waving tatters flowing after him. He wore a big crooked hat with a comically long tail, and had a bushel of straw-yellow hair sticking out from under the brim. He was tall, really tall, made even taller-looking by his tiny companion and his huge hat.

The smaller of the two looked a little hefty, in a long bottle-green coat that trailed to the ground and a skyscraping hat that made even the taller fellow’s hat look small. He, too, had a crown of golden locks billowing up beneath his hat, and stood a good foot and a half shorter than the other man. 

Their backs were to Smettleberg, and from here, he couldn’t hear what they were saying, if they were saying anything at all. Smettleberg’s mind raced, wondering if they could be related to the Cranes, but he didn’t remember them from his youth. Ma Crane had had red hair tied up behind her head, and Pa Crane had been brown-haired and balding. Surely their family couldn’t produce an ultra-tall and ultra-short blonde? Maybe they were cousins twice removed, or something, or related by marriage. Maybe they were Ma Crane and Pa Crane’s bastard kids, come to claim the property.

_ My apples!  _ Smettleberg thought to himself in a wail.  _ How can they come back here!? My apples!! Georgine is going to kill me!  _

He could imagine her sneering:  _ So you’re not man enough to go over there and take the apples for us? Scared of feeding your kids, Nathaniel? Huh? I should’ve married that Crane boy instead of you, maybe he would take care of me properly. At least he  _ **_owns_ ** _ those orchards. _

He’d patiently explain to her, time and time again, that the Crane boy was dead, so she couldn’t have married him, and she would glare and spit and stab her finger out at the door until Smettleberg burgled the appropriate amount of apples. 

A brilliant new idea sparkled in Smettleberg’s brain. 

_ Maybe they were squatters!! _

If they were  _ squatters,  _ Smettleberg could just get the sheriff to come down and shake them out. Squatters folded easily when they saw police; they quietly rolled up their things and hurried out once the ol’ men in blue cruised in. 

He crept forward through the grass, trying to catch a glimpse of what they were doing; hoping to catch a snippet of an  _ incriminatory  _ conversation, like,  _ “Goodness, isn’t it nice that we illegally started taking up residence on the Crane property, who we have no relation to?”  _

Instead, he heard soft singing. 

_ “Could you walk a little faster, said the whiting to a snail?”  _ It was the shorter of the two singing, while the other hummed a quiet accompaniment. They had moved, now; instead of both facing opposite the barn, they’d turned towards one another, and were clasped in an embrace that’d usually be reserved for a waltz.

And they  _ were  _ waltzing. The taller was following instead of leading, being careful not to tread on the shorter’s toes. The ground outside the barn had been  _ prepared  _ for this; from summers past, Smettleberg knew it to be wild and overgrown, but a large patch leading up to the barn had been cleared of grass, and flattened down for a more suitable waltzing ground. 

_ “There’s a porpoise close behind us, and he’s treading on my tail—”  _

Smettleberg couldn’t help himself. He stared, for a moment, taking in the strange ritual with huge eyes. They went through the careful, flowing motions of four boxes before the taller gracefully allowed himself (herself?) to be dipped; the shorter stuttered a moment, a sour note twisting the air as they stared into each other’s eyes, until the taller gracefully slid upward back into standard waltzing position. 

_ Herself,  _ Smettleberg determined. She was unusually tall and thin, and the tattered clothing she was wearing obscured her figure. This close, he could see a sort of veil, too, fashioned from what looked like sackcloth. 

Some kind of weird hills ceremony? A weird religious tradition from some pagans? Smettleberg’s insides were turning watery. His mother had always reared him to fear black magic, since it  _ was  _ out there, and God could only reasonably be expected to do so much. 

He had to go. He had to leave. 

She moved so oddly; with a crooked fluidness, like her limbs hadn’t been put on right but she knew how to use them anyway. Her limber legs were…  _ Enchanting.  _

_ “Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you—”  _ the man was singing, loudly, throwing weight into the song. It was the climax, Smettleberg thought, of the freaky ritual. 

_ “Won’t you join the dance,”  _ they sang together, their voices mingling together in a hoarse harmony. The woman dipped low, her legs sliding out from underneath her, and the man held her, close to his chest; after a moment, their lips met in a tender kiss. 

Smettleberg  _ fled.  _

He pushed through the grass and whipping tree branches, lest lightning strike him for being witness to a heathen ritual. No, no, no. This was horrible. This was  _ horrifying.  _ He would have to alert someone— he would have to  _ tell someone—  _ the sheriff, the national guard, the church! 

_ But a week later, he hadn’t.  _

He was gathering evidence, is what he told himself. He was spying on them to collect more evidence of pagan worship or them being claim jumpers. It wasn’t because he was bizarrely  _ fascinated  _ by the things he saw—  _ no no no,  _ sir. 

They liked to dance. Not every day, and not with that same song about the whiting, but they did it a few times over the course of Smettleberg’s reconnaissance. More often they would be out and about doing… Other things.

They gathered the apples (Smettleberg found it odd he didn’t care too much anymore), cleared grass and weeded the yards, and it looked like they slept inside the barn. The house was never touched, or even looked at too hard. They made things— though  _ what  _ things, Smettleberg didn’t know. There were all sorts of workbenches and equipment and things that were put outside, strips of cloth and odd tools that he didn’t recognize. They also made things he did recognize; they took the long strips of grass and weaved them, skillfully, into little shapes. Smettleberg’s sister did that when she was younger, and when she got older, grew up into a knitter and finger-weaver. He had gotten a sweater from her every third Christmas for the last twenty years.

The little blonde one was certainly a claim jumper. There were no doubts about it to Smettleberg. He was  _ not  _ from around here. He spoke City, and spoke British, too, throwing fancy words with the wrong accents emphasized. He was certainly  _ not  _ of the Crane bloodline, who had been settled here since before the Civil War and had never moved.

Smettleberg thought—  _ thought—  _ that the woman might’ve been Ma Crane, or maybe, her daughter. There was the same waifish body Smettleberg vaguely remembered that the Ma had, and it was hard to tell anything about her from the clothes she was wearing. Her face was veiled, her shapes downplayed, and her voice almost nonexistent whenever Smettleberg was listening in. He heard the occasional grunt or rasping voice, but he could never be  _ completely  _ sure that she wasn’t a woman… 

If it was Ma, she had gone loopy. She talked in rhyme and moved strangely, which was  _ incredibly  _ off-putting to Smettleberg. The tired voice and the gentle eyes had been replaced with this  _ thing.  _ The only other reason he continued to suspect it was her was because  _ somewhere,  _ in the back of his brain, he thought he knew it from long ago.

The crooked movements. The tottering steps. The thin figure kneeling down over the crops in the Crane garden. The shapes, the arcing movements, the spider-like fingers, the frame so slight that it was constantly swaying not to fall over. It was  _ familiar,  _ but he couldn’t grasp it; like he’d known it from some other life, some other world. He was partly convinced that spying on all the paganry had turned  _ him  _ mad. 

After the week was up, though, the answer to the riddle became clear. 

He had just set up behind the crooked trees (which were starting to get yellow-y brown; it was nearing October now) at dawn when he saw the two figures moving. 

They left the barn together. Smettleberg squinted in the darkness- the last couple of stars were starting to fade away- and he was transfixed by the scene before him. 

The woman sat on the ground, and the man followed right behind her. They took each other by the hand, and the woman made a soft, crooning sigh. Her fingers left the man’s hand to caress his cheek, gently, with an aching kind of sentimentality that Smettleberg was fervently jealous of. His wife had never touched him like that.  _ Would  _ never touch him like that. 

They spoke, and Smettleberg couldn’t quite hear them. Her voice tumbled like a waterfall spilling over rocks, distant and pleasing, if discordant. The man responded in a high twittering voice, like a bird. His hand reached out, carefully, to touch her veil; his fingers curled underneath the edge of it, and Smettleberg thought that her eyes must’ve closed. It was lifted, carefully, with the utmost tenderness and delicacy, and it was removed from her head, placed down into her hands.

They looked at one another as if they’d never seen the other before. There was a beat of silence, and the man leaned up and kissed her.

Smettleberg trembled, horror quaking his chest. He knew Ma Crane’s face. He  _ knew  _ her, and that— that was not the face of Ma Crane. That was not even the face of a woman.

That— 

_ That was a claim jumper.  _ A goddamned claim jumper who had stolen this land, who had taken it from the Cranes, vile paganites who had blasphemed God with their strange rituals and their frightening style of dress and their speaking in tongues. And  _ Smettleberg  _ had been fool enough, naive enough, to watch all of it. 

It wasn’t right. 

It wasn’t right for people to go around occupying houses that weren’t theirs. 

He went straight home, called the sheriff, and  _ demanded  _ he do something about the squatters living on the Crane lands. The operator seemed a bit irate, but promised an officer could be there within an hour or two. Smettleberg stewed in his fury, his wife’s questioning easily glancing off of him when he stomped back outside an hour later. 

It wasn’t right. He was going to  _ watch  _ those two get arrested, and then tomorrow, he was going to bring his kids to go pick apples in the yard. They were red now, sweet and good for eating. Those  _ squatters  _ had been stealing them the past few days, so there wouldn’t be as many as last year, but they were still there for the taking.

_ Squatters.  _ Teh. Not  _ squatters. Thieves.  _ Thieves who were stealing the rightful land of the people who lived here, the rightful  _ food  _ of the people who lived here. What right had they to act so strange, to eat food that wasn’t theirs, to occupy land that didn’t belong to them? 

Smettleberg hitched his horse to a tree about a half-mile from the Crane homestead and went the rest of the way on foot, anger bolstering his strength. He was going to watch them both get thrown in the back of a cop car, one way or another, and he’d explain everything to Georgine afterward. 

The officers arrived thirty minutes later. There were two men, who stepped out of their car cautiously; Smettleberg watched from his faithful position behind a tree. 

They approached the house, said something that Smettleberg couldn’t hear, then opened the door to investigate. Smettleberg wanted to yell to them: not the  _ house,  _ the barn! They live in the barn! I told your stupid operator that in the phone call! 

The taller squatter curiously poked his head out of the barn. Smettleberg wanted to yell to him:  _ yes, yes, go see the officers, and surrender yourself to them! You’ve been found out!  _

He ducked back in, and Smettleberg almost leapt out from behind his tree and yelled, “they’re in the barn, sheriff! The barn!”, but he kept his trap shut, gripping the bark beneath his hands tight enough to hurt.

The shorter squatter left the barn, dressed in a smart little coat, a tall hat, and a bowtie. The officers had left the house by this point, and noticed him. They called to him, and he called back, throwing his hands up in the air and kneeling, obediently, at their direction.

Smugly, Smettleberg thought,  _ that’s right. Arrested. Arrested! That’s what happens to criminals around here! They go to jail! You can’t break the law and get away with it!  _

On their approach to the squatter, the first officer’s head exploded. 

The gunshot sounded first, of course, splittingly loud, covering the _ splut _ of the man’s head bursting into pieces like an overripe watermelon hit with a sledgehammer. 

Smettleberg’s heart stopped, and he struggled to process for a moment. Another gunshot rang out, and he threw himself to the ground with a weak scream, covering his head like it would do anything. His ears were ringing from the noise, and his sense of balance was thrown off; branches had scratched him on the way down, and he might’ve been scraped and bleeding, but he wasn’t  _ dead.  _

His heart was pounding a million miles an hour, and he closed his eyes, gasping for breath. He was trying to be quiet. Oh, God, he didn’t want to get killed! He didn’t want to die!

A million years later, he pried his eyes open. 

The two of them were standing over the fallen officers, backs turned to Smettleberg. He couldn’t see the bodies from here, but just the knowledge that two men- two good,  _ innocent men-  _ had been murdered had him trembling and struggling to not throw up. 

_ This is my fault,  _ he thought, at the same time as  _ it could’ve been me.  _

It could  _ still  _ be him if he stayed here. He tried to get up, but his knees were shaking so hard— he fell back down into the brush, scraping his palms and legs. The sound of him crunching in the foliage was loud, too loud, and he almost let out a hysteric keen. Tears were spilling down his cheeks. Jesus Christ, Jesus  _ Christ,  _ he didn’t want to die.  _ He didn’t want to die.  _

He got up, in a flurry of motion, nearly tripping and falling a half-dozen times. He threw a glance back, to see if they’d noticed him, but they hadn’t. There were no pursuers.

Still, though, his feet barely grazed the ground on his sprint back to his horse, made in record time. He threw himself on its back and whipped it with the utmost urgency, and it nearly broke a leg in his haste to get away. 

He went home, sequestered himself in his room, and locked the door. Two men were  _ dead,  _ and Smettleberg had watched it happen. 

Once he’d had a moment to process, he did the only thing he could think of:

Called his sister.

=

Joan T. Smettleberg (yes, she knew the name was  _ odd,  _ she’d gotten a lot of weird looks and incorrect pronunciations over the years) was awoken by the insistent blaring of her cellphone. 

She inhaled, the wrath of the newly risen coursing through her veins, and glanced at the clock- it was  _ eight in the morning, what the hell, Nate-  _ and answered.

“Hello?” She asked, softly, voice thick and blurred. The woman lying next to Joan- Joan’s girlfriend of about three months- hadn’t stirred yet, and Joan was interested in keeping it that way.

_ “Joan, I don’t know what the hell to do,”  _ Nate sounded  _ scared,  _ and whatever trace of milky sleepiness that Joan had left instantly evaporated. She slipped out of bed and started getting dressed. She had this weird, creeping suspicion that something unspeakably  _ terrible  _ had happened. Nate wasn’t the type to spook easy. 

“Is it Ma?” Joan asked, quietly, tugging her pants on. The phone was kept precariously squeezed between her shoulder and ear. 

_ “No, what, no— Ma’s fine, why, did she tell you something was wrong—? I just— God, Joan, I saw two cops get s-shot, thirty minutes ago—”  _

“Shot?” She had to clamp her mouth shut, nervously eyeing Bella’s slumbering form. Softer, she repeated, “ _ Shot,  _ Nate?” 

_ “Yeah, shot,”  _ Nate breathed.  _ “I just— there were squatters, out by the old Crane household. You— you remember the Cranes?”  _

They swam vaguely in the soup of Joan’s memory. She’d left the backwater dump she’d grown up in as soon as she could, moving to Jersey for college, then staying since she had steady work in an advertising agency. She was closing in on her twenty-fifth anniversary at the company by now. 

The Cranes  _ did  _ sound familiar, though. She remembered a big, broad man built like a brick house and just as red, face constantly purpled with anger and body bristling with unshaven brown hair. He had the kind of voice that shook the ground when he was furious, which seemed to be most of the time. She also remembered the sad, scared figure of Crane’s wife, a slender thing who constantly looked to be in pain, but was kindly to the children in the town. Joan suspected it was out of obligation, though, part of a misguided need to keep up appearances as opposed to any kind of legitimate empathetic connection. 

She thought they might’ve had a child— a daughter? A son? She remembered the sound of the Smettleberg matriarch quietly murmuring to her husband over tea when Joan was supposed to be asleep, talking about grown-up things like  _ death  _ and  _ illegitimate children  _ and all those interesting things little kids aren’t supposed to care about. They certainly had a  _ grandmother,  _ who was found after the Crane house was investigated since the Crane father had been growing— what was it, marijuana? These memories were from so long ago. Joan wasn’t even sure any of that had been right, but she seemed to remember a dead grandmother and a father who had been jailed… 

“Yes, I remember the Cranes,” Joan said. 

_ “There were squatters there— two men—”  _

“Uh-huh,” Joan said. 

_ “I thought they might’ve been the Cranes come back,”  _ Nate said, voice cracking with remorse.  _ “I watched them for a week and then I realized they’re not the Cranes. Then I called the sheriffs, and—”  _ He broke off.  __

“Were they gang members or something?” Joan wondered, aloud. 

_ “No!”  _ Nate burst out.  _ “They’re pagans. Satanists.”  _

That gave Joan some pause.

“What?” 

_ “They were doing weird dances. They wore weird clothes!”  _

“What does that even  _ mean,  _ Nate?” Joan’s imagination was vividly filled with hooded cultists in robes, preparing to sacrifice her brother over some bloody altar. Her heart beat a frantic drum in her chest. Her brother wasn’t made for this sort of thing.  _ She  _ wasn’t made for this sort of thing.

_ “There was a tall one, wearing all black. His clothes were torn up into strips. He wore a big hat— a big hat with a floppy tail, like a witch!! He wore a mask made out of burlap and had hair made of straw, and, and, he always spoke in rhyme, too!”  _ Nate was nearly in hysterics.  _ “There was a short one, small and ugly with blonde hair and crooked teeth— he always had on a huge top hat and a giant coat even though it’s summer, for Chrissake—” _

Those descriptions faintly stimulated some part of Joan’s brain. 

“Oh my God,” she said. “Oh my God!” 

_ “What? What!?”  _ Nate asked, frantically. 

The entire city of Gotham- scratch that, the entire  _ state of New Jersey-  _ had been on a lookout for Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter ever since they’d escaped Arkham two months ago.

_ No way. No  _ **_way_ ** _ that Scarecrow and Mad Hatter were  _ **_there—_ ** _ The odds were so slim—! How could they possibly be  _ **_there!?_ **

“Are you safe?” Joan asked, stuffing her feet into her shoes. She threw her jacket on, slapped her pocket to make sure her keys were there, and hurried out of her apartment, sparing only a moment to lock the door behind her. 

_ “I, I, I think so,”  _ Nate stammered.  _ “What’s going on? Do you know them, Joan?”  _

“I think so. And I do know what to do about it,” Joan said, decisively. “I’m going to call Batman.”

She took the stairs three at a time, catapulting herself down them at maximum speed. “Those two guys you described sound  _ exactly  _ like the Mad Hatter and the Scarecrow, or at least lookalikes, and I’m sure Batman will want to know all about this!” 

=

“We don’t want to know about this,” a man with a pinched face, sitting behind the police station’s shiny, gigantic desk, said. “You need to contact the people in his county, not  _ us.”  _

“But it’s the Mad Hatter and Scarecrow!” Joan insisted, resisting her urge to pound her hand on the desk. “People  _ died!”  _

“We’ll reroute,” the man said, patiently, “but you really should get your brother to call his local authorities. You can’t expect the Gotham police department to do something about a crime that took place in  _ Georgia—”  _

“I don’t want cops, I want  _ Batman,”  _ Joan insisted. 

“I want you to not waste valuable police time,” the man said back. “There’s nothing I can do here. I don’t have a magical telephone line to Batman that I can use, and I can’t do anything about criminals hundreds of miles away.  _ Tell your brother to call the local authorities.”  _

“I’m not leaving until I see Batman,” Joan threatened. 

“You won’t be  _ leaving  _ because you’ll be arrested for obstructing the police,” the butt of the man’s pen bounced on the countertop in annoyance. 

“Batman should know! Can’t you— can’t you take a note or something!?” Joan shouted back, frustrated. “They’re only the two biggest criminals since  _ the Joker!”  _

The man’s expression became ugly; his pale face was starting to flush. “Listen, ma’am—” 

“Connolly, what’s going on here?”

A man walked up from behind them, and Joan turned, instinctively sensing that this was someone who would  _ listen  _ to her, someone who could get things done. He had snow-white hair and a neatly groomed mustache, glasses with square frames and a body shaped like a rectangle. He was solidly built, in one of those “grandpa who keeps lifting weights even though his kids tell him not to” kind of way. His beige trenchcoat was long and slightly shabby, tie loose around his throat. He was orbited by a half-dozen people, a mixture of officers and reporters trying to ask him questions and brief him on things. Joan made the leap to presume that this was the chief of police, Commissioner James Gordon. His face seemed familiar, anyway.

“This woman—” Connolly began, and Joan interrupted.

“I know where Scarecrow and Mad Hatter are,” she said, authoritatively. Before Gordon could reply, Connolly interjected. 

“Commissioner, I’ve had ten reports in the last  _ week  _ of Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter, and she’s reporting them in  _ Georgia.  _ This isn’t the GCPD’s concern.”  

Gordon’s dark eyes flashed, and he seemed to really look at Joan. Determination set the commissioner's jaw.

“But it is  _ Batman’s.”  _

Fifteen minutes later, she was in a surprisingly roomy interrogation room, seated on an uncomfortable chair across from Commissioner Gordon and the Batman. Batman had prowled in and stayed near the wall, barely visible in the shadows, while Gordon had straightforwardly gone for the chair across from Joan. 

“What do you know,” Batman did not say it as a question. 

“I mean, it’s not me,” she said, nervously, “It’s my brother, Nathaniel. He lives in Georgia, and he saw…” 

“Can we talk to him?” Batman asked, with a disarming gentleness. “And Jim, you must be busy. You can go.” 

“I’ll stay,” the commissioner said, tersely. He nodded in Joan’s direction.

She called Nate back, and put him on speakerphone. Batman and the commissioner grilled him for details, which he relayed. 

_ These two men appeared. I noticed them a week ago. I don’t know how long they could’ve been there before that. Maybe a while. They looked like this. They acted like this. They danced like that. They did these things. This morning they shot two police officers and killed them. They live at the old Crane household.  _

“Crane household,” the Commissioner picked up on that, and looked towards Batman with an uneasy expression. 

“Can you tell me more about the people who lived there before? The Cranes?” 

_ “I don’t know too much,”  _ Nate said.  _ “They kept to themselves.”  _

“I think the old Crane is in jail,” Joan said.

_ “I don’t know about that,”  _ Nate said.  _ “But Ma Crane moved away, and they didn’t have no other family.”  _

“They had a kid,” Joan recalled. 

“A kid,” Batman echoed. 

_ “He’s dead,”  _ Nate said, anxiously.  _ “Died twenty-five years ago. Does this matter?”  _

“More than you think,” Batman said. “How do you know he died?” 

_ “He just is,”  _ Nate said.  _ “Everyone knows it. Ma and Pa Crane left and their son died.”  _

“Was it a son? I thought it was a daughter,” Joan said. “Mom said so, anyway.” 

_ “Pa said it was a son, and he died,”  _  Nate snapped back. 

“How did he die?” 

_ “I don’t know! Why does it matter?”  _ Nate was growing more anxious the longer they spoke. It couldn’t be easy, watching people be killed like that, and then getting grilled by the Dark Knight… Joan’d need to come visit. Or invite him and his family up here, more like. 

Batman and Gordon exchanged glances again.

“Can I have the address, Mr. Smettleberg?” The Dark Knight asked. Nathaniel obediently rattled it off. “Thank you. Stay in your home, do  _ not  _ go back out there. You’ve been very helpful, and I’d suggest you get in contact with a doctor. What you saw today would be a strain on anyone.” 

The Dark Knight swept out of the room without another word, and Joan looked between the door and the Commissioner. 

“So he’s—” 

“Going to do what he does best,” the Commissioner confirmed. He withdrew a pack of cigarettes from the inner pocket of his coat, tapped one out, and stuck it in his mouth. He shielded it with his hand as he flicked his lighter on, and exhaled a cloud of smoke. 

He rose from his chair, raising one hand hesitatingly over Joan’s shoulder- an instinctive gesture of comfort- before lowering it back to his side, seeming to think better of himself. “Your brother’ll be fine. Not sure about Batman, though.” 

The Commissioner stared at the door, his face a collage of misery, regret, and wistfulness. He breathed out another lungful of smoke. 

“These are strange times we live in,” the Commissioner said, musingly. “Batman’s taken up with a criminal like Ratcatcher, but killed the Joker, too.” He looked down at his hands, watching the cigarette between his fingers with a painful consideration. Joan almost got the feeling that he’d forgotten she was even there. 

He took another puff, and said to himself,  _ “‘Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows.’”  _

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave comments! I love them. <:)


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